Is it safe to store coins in the telegram wallet?

[NotATether]

It's not even clear whether OP's friend talking about wallet provided by Telegram itself or someone else (in form of bot). Although both of them are custodial, where ones provided by Telegram itself also have KYC requirement. And aside from what others said, IMO it's not very safe to combine messaging and wallet on same application.

Telegram asking for a KYC identification as part of the requirement for using their wallet is unsettling in my opinion, because social media companies should be having no business collecting such identification unless you are running ads on their platform.

Let's forget that they are a company and no community project.

Maybe the Telegram wallet KYC is being handled by a third-party. That's the only way I see this making sense.

[Crwth]

I think the most important part when using a Telegram wallet is that you don’t put too much on it that you are not willing to risk losing because you could just put it in a hardware wallet where it is safer. Make sure that your number is always updated and no one has access to it so you can be sure that it is only you who have control.

[|MINER|]

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I haven't use the telegram wallet yet but I have some worst experience while using the telegram some times I got banned and while I  forgot the password I have to use the forgot option and if the backup email or the phone number is unaccessible then you have to reactive the account that's means the all data will be deleted and account will be new. So regarding all of these issues I have doubt using the telegram wallet.

[ABCbits]

It's not even clear whether OP's friend talking about wallet provided by Telegram itself or someone else (in form of bot). Although both of them are custodial, where ones provided by Telegram itself also have KYC requirement. And aside from what others said, IMO it's not very safe to combine messaging and wallet on same application.

Telegram asking for a KYC identification as part of the requirement for using their wallet is unsettling in my opinion, because social media companies should be having no business collecting such identification unless you are running ads on their platform.

Let's forget that they are a company and no community project.

Maybe the Telegram wallet KYC is being handled by a third-party. That's the only way I see this making sense.

Their wallet is custodial by default, so i don't think they can operate it legally (on some country) without KYC. And i just found out they also provide self-custodial option, although custodial remain the default option.

[bee]

I believe the security level of Telegram Wallet depends on the security level of Telegram itself, and so far it has been quite good. At least, I haven't heard of anyone's Telegram Wallet being hacked due to a flaw in the code or Telegram itself.

I think the security of the wallet does not fully depend on Telegram because they are developed separately. The embedded wallet feature in Telegram is provided by a 3rd party. https://telegram.org/tos/mini-apps
I have not had any experience with this wallet. But feeling how to use Telegram, there are some extra risks compared to stand-alone wallets in general. So it is not recommended to store large amounts of funds there.

[NotATether]

The answer: Absolutely not!


The reason being that Telegram accounts get hacked all the time, and people are willing to take over an account that doesn't even have any money on it, imagine what they will do to hijack an account that has a lot of TON inside? That's why I do not advise anyone use the Telegram TON wallet unless you are interested in losing all your coins. (which is nobody ever.)

[Kemarit]

It's Telegram for Christ's sake, so how can be in secure? We've heard horror stories and already and so it doesn't make sense for people to really trust it. Specially if a 3rd party is involved on the developed of the wallet, you really don't know what's inside the code and there could really be exploits that hackers can take advantage.

So the obvious answer is No, it's not safe. And let this be a lesson to the OP's friend and to us as well who are thinking of joining the craze on Telegram as it could be the next hype.

[Asiska02]

I just found out that some people, particularly those who mine meme coins on Telegram, are storing their coins in Telegram wallets. A friend of mine complained angrily to me about the wallet that his telegram account was hacked and he has no access to his wallet again if there is any way I could assist him, and I told him I don't know about the wallet because I don't know how safe it is.
in my opinion, if there is anything that will prevent a user from accessing their wallet, I can't recommend using it. But I'd like to hear your thoughts on any possible solutions to this issue and whether it's safe for us to store our coins in the Telegram wallet.

It is not safe to save your funds with any third party wallet whether it on telegram or off telegram. Telegram is a social media platform and social media accounts are very vulnerable to attacks very well unlike other platforms. When a user does not take the security of their wallet serious, the end of it is that they’ll either lose the account to hackers or even a person close by can have access to their wallet and transfer all of their funds out of the wallet.

The most vulnerability you can face by using a telegram wallet is that your account can easily be banned when reported for any activity that is prohibited by the platform. Even if you keep your account  so safe to use, it can be banned when reported for something. The best you can do is to stay away from any activity that can lead to that and most importantly don’t use the wallet as your primary wallet to keep most of your money.

[bhadz]

I won't do that. I know that many of you are into airdrops and telegram mining of games but I will not put any money on that wallet. It's because for my safety and I am not yet convinced that this wallet is safe to store coins. If my purpose is to store coins then I'd choose the other ones that isn't associated with my phone number. This is the security flaw of a telegram wallet, your number is associated with your telegram account thus, your wallet too.

[Lucius]

As @Lucius (+1) has said very well, those wallets in which the users do not control the private keys are not really ours, that's the first thing any user approaching cryptocurrencies for the first time should learn. Any wallet (especially hardware wallets) is much more secure than wallets that "depend" on some type of service, like Telegram in this case, even software wallets in which we control the private keys. Your friend has learned a hard lesson.

However, it should be emphasized that even non-custodial wallets can be potentially dangerous, so they should not be trusted blindly. A good example is the popular Ledger, which was always known as an example of a safe and reliable hardware wallet until a major database hack occurred, which caused major problems for most of their users, and then they introduced the Seed Recovery service, which, if approved, divides our backup into three parts and sent to three different "addresses".

The very fact that the seed can be extracted from the device (remotely) brought a lot of distrust in the company, especially because they claimed all the time that it was not possible.

I think the most important part when using a Telegram wallet is that you don’t put too much on it that you are not willing to risk losing because you could just put it in a hardware wallet where it is safer. Make sure that your number is always updated and no one has access to it so you can be sure that it is only you who have control.

In that case, there is another danger called SIM swap, which would mean that someone who is marked as a target can become a victim of such an attack. In some countries, all you need to get a new SIM card is to go to your operator's point of sale and tell your mobile phone number.

[Yamzakid]

The most vulnerability you can face by using a telegram wallet is that your account can easily be banned when reported for any activity that is prohibited by the platform. Even if you keep your account  so safe to use, it can be banned when reported for something. The best you can do is to stay away from any activity that can lead to that and most importantly don’t use the wallet as your primary wallet to keep most of your money.

Thanks I really find this helpful, and I will also share this as an advice to anyone out there to prevent any activity that may lead to the banning of their Telegram account, as well as to avoid using the Telegram wallet or any third-party wallet.

[bitmover]

The most vulnerability you can face by using a telegram wallet is that your account can easily be banned when reported for any activity that is prohibited by the platform. Even if you keep your account  so safe to use, it can be banned when reported for something. The best you can do is to stay away from any activity that can lead to that and most importantly don’t use the wallet as your primary wallet to keep most of your money.

Thanks I really find this helpful, and I will also share this as an advice to anyone out there to prevent any activity that may lead to the banning of their Telegram account, as well as to avoid using the Telegram wallet or any third-party wallet.

Being banned and lose many is terrible...

Other than that, it is basically a mobile wallet.
Don't store large amounts on it. Just use for a few bucks,  when making small payments that you do often..

I have small amounts in my mobile wallet as well, about 150 usd

[Sim_card]

I have never used such a wallet and i would never do so. Why use a telegram wallet when there are a lot of recommended wallets out there to choose from, i am sure this wallet is custodial and it is not open source.

If it is altcoins you want to store, there is a recommended option in Unstoppable wallet, it is also open source, and if it is for BTC, you can use Electrum or BlueWallet, however if you'll be storing a lot of funds, then use a hardware wallet or run Electrum in an airgapped device.

I know that self custody wallet that is open source is the best to store your coins as you mentioned above, but what I am confused at is that, is it all coins meme coins and altcoins that can be stored in a hardware wallet like unstoppable wallet because some of this new meme coins are not yet listed in an exchange. I know that Telegram wallet is very risky and can be hacked easily because it is a third-party wallet.

[Baofeng]

We all need to take into account that it also requires KYC, and everything is tied with your device so if you lose it, then your crypto is gone for good.

And also it's a 3rd party and not built by Telegram itself, so that makes another red flag for us as we should not trust, but verify. And it is also not self-custody so for experience crypto users, it's a no-no.

[Z-tight]

I know that self custody wallet that is open source is the best to store your coins as you mentioned above, but what I am confused at is that, is it all coins meme coins and altcoins that can be stored in a hardware wallet like unstoppable wallet because some of this new meme coins are not yet listed in an exchange. I know that Telegram wallet is very risky and can be hacked easily because it is a third-party wallet.

I will agree that i do not know too much about meme coins and wallets that they are compatible with. Take note that Unstoppable wallet isn't a hardware wallet, but an open source multi-coin software wallet, though it does not have too many coins listed. However, there are also multi-coin hardware wallets that you can check if they are compatible with the coins you want to store. My point is that i'd never use a telegram wallet to store coins.