A request to block popular messaging app Telegram by country’s media authority Roskomnxdzor was granted by a Russian district court here. The reason for the blockade is the refusal of the company to hand over encryption keys.

The decision was made on Friday after a 40-minute hearing in Moscow in which company’s lawyers did not attend at the request of Telegram’s founder and chief executive, Pavel Durov.

The case was brought to the court by the FSB last year. FSB is Russia internal security service.

The agency FSB had requested Telegram to hand over it’s encryption keys so that the authorities can read all messages sent using Telegram.

Durov also announced later that Telegram would use built-in systems to circumnavigate the ban.

But, on his page in the VK social network, he said that he is not able to guarantee users would be able to retain access to Telegram without using virtual private networks (VPNs).

A VPN (virtual private networks) is a technology in networking that is used to get around restricted internet services and improve anonymity.

According to the FSB, Telegram is under extensive usage by “international terrorist organisations”, and its encryption technology makes it very hard for the security agency to track their communications.

But Telegram refused to give away the encryption keys by saying that it would not compromise the privacy of its 200 million users around the world.

Judge Yulia Smolina had said in her decision that the ban needs to be implemented immediately, Russian press agency TASS reported.

“The ban on access to information will be in force until the FSB’s demands are met on providing keys for decrypting user messages,” she said.

Durov said in a reaction to the Friday’s decision that it implied the Russian government was motivated by money.

“The power that local governments have over IT corporations is based on money. At any given moment, a government can crash their stocks by threatening to block revenue streams from its markets and thus force these companies to do strange things,” he said.

“Privacy is not for sale, and human rights should not be compromised out of fear or greed.”

With about 9.5 million users in Russia alone, Telegram is considered to be the most popular encrypted messaging service in the country. The app is used both by the private citizens and government extensively. They use it for sending of messages and making conference calls.

The telegram was blocked in other countries too like in Iran and Indonesia.

In the Iranian case, it was used extensively by the protesters who used the app to plan and coordinate protests to go against the government around the country at the end of 2017.

Due to this reason, the app was blocked by the Iranian government for a few weeks.

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