Telegram removes controversial “People Nearby” feature

Telegram has removed the “People Nearby” feature that allowed users to find other users nearby. Security concerns may have led to this decision.

The popular messenger service Telegram, regularly with new updatesrecently removed a feature from its app that allowed users to find people nearby. By sharing their location, users could see which other Telegram members were in their area – including the approximate distance. However, this feature was met with mixed opinions, as it not only showed private people, but also exposed shady activities such as drug deals, prostitution and bots, such as NextG.tv reported.

What was the People Nearby feature?

The “People Nearby” feature allowed users who actively shared their location to discover other Telegram users in their local area. This applied to both private individuals and public groups and channels, which was a convenient way for some users to find new contacts or communities of interest. The feature was particularly popular with groups, as they were easier to find and join locally.

Reasons for removal

Officially, Telegram, which currently has around 950 million users, has not yet given any precise reasons for removing the feature. However, due to the potential for abuse that this feature entailed, this could have been a security measure. In addition to legitimate users, profiles that engaged in illegal or dubious activities also kept cropping up. Drug sellers, prostitution and other illegal offers could easily be found in the app, which became increasingly problematic for Telegram. This type of use could have increased the pressure on the company to remove the feature.

Impact on users

While many will likely barely notice the removal of the feature, there are still users who have used People Nearby as a convenient way to connect. Groups and local communities in particular have found the feature useful as it has made it easier to recruit new members. However, the loss seems to be small for most users as many of these groups were already low in activity and unmaintained.

It is currently unclear how this change will affect other countries. Verified reports from Germany show that the function is no longer available there. It remains to be seen whether this will happen worldwide or whether Telegram will maintain the function in certain regions.