Researcher refuses Telegram’s bounty award, discloses auto-delete bug

Enlarge (credit: Joshua Sortino)

Telegram patched another image self-destruction bug in its app earlier this year. This flaw was a different issue from the one reported in 2019. But the researcher who reported the bug isn't pleased with Telegram's months-long turnaround time-and an offered $1,159 (1,000) bounty award in exchange for his silence.

Self-destructed images remained on the device

Like other messaging apps, Telegram allows senders to set communications to "self-destruct," such that messages and any media attachments are automatically deleted from the device after a set period of time. Such a feature offers extended privacy to both the senders and the recipients intending to communicate discreetly.

In February 2021, Telegram introduced a set of such auto-deletion features in its 2.6 release:

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