Messaging applications have become second-nature to a lot of smartphone users these days, and while users love them, not everyone else does. The carriers, like AT&T and Verizon, have never been too keen on them as they essentially killed the idea of making serious profit on SMS messages and it turned Data into one of the biggest factors of competition. As for world governments, they’re not happy with how easy it has become to communicate without using the regular channels, channels that these governments have a glass and ear passed up against. In Brazil, WhatsApp recently faced a 48 Hour ban, issued by the government, due to a legal investigation. Unsurprisingly, Telegram is the service to benefit at WhatsApp’s misfortune.
Brazilian networks have been ordered to block traffic to and from WhatsApp, essentially rendering the app and service useless. The reason behind the ban is that WhatsApp has allegedly been used for “pirate services” in the country, and should be regulated just as SMS and other services are. Telegram has now seen 1.5 Million or more new users hit the service in the wake of the Brazilian ban, and they say that this number is only increasing and that they have “all hands on deck” to keep up with the “crazy load”. This isn’t the first time that Telegram has benefitted from WhatsApp’s misfortune, when the network went down for a couple of days due to server issues, Telegram was the network that users jumped to, and that is arguably how Telegram got to be so big.
Telegram is using their Twitter account to keep new users up-to-date with any issues, and they’ve had a number of progress reports regarding the influx of new users. One thing that is strange to see is that the company has yet to speak out about the Brazilian government’s decision, which is a little ironic as the same could foreseeably happen to Telegram over time. Regardless, it looks like Telegram is benefitting from an unfortunate situation, and this just goes to show that choice is always a good thing, as the people of Brazil have another option to use when another comes under attack.