Investigation by Russia’s FSB security agency on Monday has revealed that Telegram messaging service was used by those behind the Saint Petersburg metro bombing.
“During the probe into the April 3 terrorist attack in the Saint Petersburg metro, the FSB received reliable information about the use of Telegram by the suicide bomber, his accomplices and their mastermind abroad to conceal their criminal plans,” the FSB said in a statement.
The FSB statement said that the terrorists used the Telegram app “at each stage of the preparation of this terrorist attack”.
The Saint Petersburg bombing took the lives of fifteen people, and the Imam Shamil Battalion, a group suspected to have links to Al-Qaeda, claimed responsibility of the attack.
Telegram is a free Russian-designed messaging app that lets people exchange messages, photos and videos in groups of up to 5,000.
It has attracted about 100 million users since its launch in 2013.
But the service has drawn the ire of critics who say it can let criminals and terrorists communicate without fear of being tracked by police, pointing in particular to its use by Islamic State jihadists.
The app is one of several targeted in a legal crackdown by Russian authorities on the internet and on social media sites in particular.
Since January 1, internet companies have been required to store all users’ personal data at data centres in Russia and provide it to the authorities on demand.
Draft legislation that has already secured initial backing in Russian parliament would make it illegal for messaging services to have anonymous users, but Telegram’s Russian chief executive, Pavel Durov feels this will compromise the privacy of the app users.
He stressed that compromising the privacy of Telegram’s users would force them, including “high-ranking Russian officials,” to communicate via apps based in the United States like Facebook-owned WhatsApp.
32-year-old Durov created Russia’s popular VKontakte social media site before founding Telegram in the United States.