Telegram has blocked the Smart Voting bot. Pavel Durov explained this by “days of silence”

The Telegram administration blocked the Smart Voting bot, explaining this by “days of silence” during the elections. About it reported the founder of the messenger Pavel Durov.

The blocking of “Smart Voting” took place on the night of September 18. The bot stopped working both in Russia and in other countries, including via VPN. When you try to open Smart Voting, a notification appears that the bot is “violating local laws.”

Earlier, Pavel Durov said that Telegram would block “bots associated with the election campaign.” The founder of the messenger explained this decision by observing the “days of silence”.

“Since the election campaign in Russia has come to an end and the election process itself has begun, the so-called“ days of silence ”begin – a tradition enshrined in the laws of many countries, which provides for the absence of campaigning during the elections themselves. We consider this practice to be legitimate and urge Telegram users to respect it, “Durov wrote.

In addition, he criticized the blocking of the Navalny application with the Smart Voting function by Apple and Google in Russian stores, stressing that “the Apple and Google oligopoly is a threat to freedom of speech.”

“The change in Apple and Google’s policy will inevitably affect Telegram, as they, as the creators of the two major mobile operating systems, are at the top of the information distribution food chain and can dictate the rules of the game to developers like us,” the post says.

In addition to Smart Voting, fake bots were blocked in the messenger, which offered other candidates under the guise of Smart Voting.

As a reminder, on the morning of September 17, Google and Apple removed the Navalny app from Russian stores. Since mid-August, Roskomnadzor has demanded this, threatening companies with fines. As noted by The New York Times and Bloomberg, Google made the decision to remove the application under threat of criminal prosecution of its employees.

Earlier, Roskomnadzor also demanded from Apple, Google, Cloudflare and Cisco not to allow Smart Voting to bypass the blocking. The service website has been blocked in Russia for several weeks.