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Photo: KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV / AFP
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) has distanced herself from her threat to have the Messenger service Telegram blocked in the event of further violations of German laws.
"Of course it's not my goal to switch off Telegram," Faeser said on Thursday on Hessischer Rundfunk.
With her shutdown threat in an interview two weeks ago, she was primarily concerned with “increasing the pressure”.
In the weekly newspaper Die Zeit, Faeser described the shutdown of Telegram as the "ultima ratio".
She now told HR-Info that at the time she had only "tightened the pace" towards Telegram "a little bit" in order to ensure that the service would take action when it came to death threats, hatred and hate speech on the Internet.
Via Telegram, users can commit crimes largely unhindered by the operators.
Death threats against politicians, researchers and activists are regularly published there.
As early as the summer, a SPIEGEL investigation showed how the operators around the Russian billionaire Pavel Durow eluded the authorities.
In mid-December, the police searched objects belonging to members of a chat group who had murder plans against Saxon Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU) on Telegram.
A Telegram task force has started work at the BKA
In December, Faeser told SPIEGEL how she wanted to do more against extremists on Telegram.
Among other things, she suggested increasing the pressure on Google and Apple to enforce their app store rules on Telegram.
She also wanted to increase the police pressure to investigate extremists on Telegram.
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Radical groups on Telegram: We need more raids against propagandists A SPIEGEL editorial by Max Hoppenstedt
On Wednesday, a task force on Telegram started work at the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA).
It is intended to identify and prosecute suspects who spread threats, insults or calls for murder via the platform.
Telegram is increasingly developing "into a medium of radicalization," explained the BKA.
The federal government wants to get Telegram to take decisive action against hatred and hate speech.
However, the company is not available to the German authorities.
Founded by a Russian, the company is based in Dubai.
Telegram did not react to two fine warnings sent in April last year.
mak/AFP