Telegram OPSEC: Privacy Settings Every Darknet User Must Configure

Telegram is NOT a secure messenger for anonymous communication, but it's widely used in darknet communities. If you must use it, these configurations minimize metadata leakage.

Critical Settings

Privacy → Phone Number: set to 'Nobody'. Privacy → Last Seen: set to 'Nobody'. Privacy → Profile Photos: 'My Contacts' at minimum. Privacy → Forwarded Messages: 'Nobody' (prevents linking when forwarded). Privacy → Calls: 'Nobody' (calls leak IP). Privacy → Groups: 'My Contacts' (prevents adding you to tracking groups).

Registration

Telegram requires a phone number — this is a fundamental privacy weakness. Use a prepaid SIM purchased with cash, a virtual phone number service, or a VoIP number for registration. Never use your personal phone number. Consider using Telegram through the Tor SOCKS5 proxy (Settings → Advanced → Connection type → TCP with proxy).

What Telegram Knows

Phone number, IP addresses (unless using proxy), device information, contacts (if synced), message metadata (who you talk to, when, how often). Regular chats are NOT end-to-end encrypted — only 'Secret Chats' are. Telegram can and does comply with law enforcement requests for non-E2E data.