Russia

[tavurth]

Any plans to implement something similar to the current telegram VPN system to allow Russian clients to connect via https://web.telegram.org?

[hooddy]

Как вы себе представляете, чтобы приложение работающее в браузере перекрывало настройки браузера, т.е. использовало свои собственные? Нонсенс.

[tavurth]

It seems like the current DNS resolution for https://web.telegram.org => 149.154.167.120 has been blocked. Getting a couple of aliases up and running would perhaps get that milestone out of the way. example

As for the client connections, perhaps this is something which could be brought up with TG directly? The web application shown here is an ideal entry point for users. Since the Russian user-base is so large, it would make sense to further support this.

@hooddy The idea is to start a discussion on the issue, perhaps you have some fresh ideas about how to get around these hurdles?

[hooddy]

@tavurth sorry I don't. Web apps get settings from browser and os. So how do they can avoid it and use any other settings? I think this cant be done.

[dddpaul]

Hi.

I live in Russia and access to *.telegram.org is blocked for me. So I deployed webogram in US hosting and have access to web-interface with my browser.

But when I'm trying to sign in, browser sends request to https://venus.web.telegram.org/apiw1 which is blocked too :)

The obvious solution is to proxy these requests through my server but is it real?

[juliogonzalez]

@dddpaul, that depends. If we are talking about a shared web hosting, then it is not possible.

But if you own the server, then you could install a Proxy (SQUID for example, make sure you secure it), and use it in your browser (for all traffic or only for *.telegram.org) or -of course- you can install openVPN on the server.

An alternative to the US server (if it is shared hosting) is having a VPS (Virtual Private Server) with a very well known french hosting company (I don't want to spam so I will not write the name) for ~3€/month (it should be enough for most cases).

BTW: If, according to @tavurth, DNS resolution was blocked as well, just don't use your ISP's DNS (use Google's 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 for example) or make sure you resolve DNS requests using the proxy (or if you use VPN make sure you use DNS from the VPN and that at least you are tunneling all telegram traffic trough the VPN)

NOTE: So far Yandex.ru DNS 77.88.8.8 and 77.88.8.1 are still resolving.

[NikKovIos]

I've used Franz with web version of telegram. Write this just in case )

[stek29]

1673

[penartur]

@dddpaul

The obvious solution is to proxy these requests through my server but is it real?

It was real. I've set up webogram fork on my own domain (behind cloudflare), and changed API endpoints from venus.web.telegram.org etc to the subdomains of my own domain (proxied to real venus.web.telegram.org by cloudflare). Anybody could navigate to my domain and use webogram without any additional configuration (and without being affected by government bans).

However, it all stopped working a couple of days ago. Now, for all API requests made to my subdomains, with origin headers of my domain, I'm getting 302 permanent redirect to core.telegram.org, without any explanation. I tried to work around this problem, but had no success. Looks like something changed on telegram backend side.

This problem is quite important for many organizations where employees are not allowed to install third-party software to their workstations, do not have admin rights, but do have unrestricted internet access. Webogram was the only way to communicate from our workstations for us, and after Russian bans, we switched to my webogram fork. Now we can only use telegram from our phones.

[stek29]

@penartur does something like this work?