“Telegram has been unresponsive to Hope Not Hate’s flagging of extremist antisemitic channels and accounts. Hermansson says that the organisation has reached out to the platform with a list of the worst-offending channels advocating for terror. “And they’re still up there. The ones that have disappeared have disappeared of their own accord,” he says. “Not because of Telegram.” That is dangerous, he says, because the impact of these channels can very easily bleed into the offline world. The British fascist group Patriotic Alternative has established a significant presence on Telegram, while the transnational neo-Nazi outfit AtomWaffen Division, which has been linked to at least 11 murders worldwide, has also managed to expand its reach thanks to the platform. “It’s not just kind of a fluffy ideology we are talking about,” says Hermansson. “It’s actual terror propaganda.””
