Spanish Court Orders Nationwide Suspension Of Telegram (Photo by Dima Solomin on Unsplash)

Spain”s High Court has recently ordered the temporary suspension of Telegram in the country. This significant ruling came after media companies in Spain filed copyright infringement complaints against the popular instant messaging app.

Spanish media companies, including Mediaset, Atresmedia, Movistar, and Egeda, had earlier complained that Telegram was permitting its users to upload content, generated by them and protected by copyright, without their permission. The ruling is crucial for Telegram, as it is the fourth most-used messaging platform in the country.

Reuters, citing competition watchdog CNMC, reported that Telegram was used by nearly 19 percent of Spaniards surveyed by CNMC. The platform also said that it had more than 700 million monthly active users worldwide in 2023.

Judge Santiago Pedraz from Spain’s high court decided to suspend Telegram after the company refused to cooperate with the court in connection with the copyright infringement case. According to Euronews, the judge had asked Telegram to send certain information to the case. However, Telegram failed to respond to this request. The report, citing legal sources, also mentioned that the suspension is temporary and will only last for a few days.

Access to Telegram was banned by certain mobile phone providers on Saturday itself. Meanwhile, several users criticised the Spanish court for this move. However, judge Santiago Pedraz said that the decision was due to the platform”s lack of cooperation.

Telegram, which was launched in 2013, is mainly competing against Meta-owned WhatsApp in the instant messaging space. Countries, including China and Iraq, had also earlier banned Telegram.