Ever since the newly resumed hostilities in 2024 and since the on-going conflict in 2025, Telegram has played a key role as a hybrid warfare tool employed by Russia against Ukraine. Telegram is more or less being used by the Federal Security Service (FSB of the Russian Federation) to recruit Ukrainians particularly the youths into espionage and terrorism. With Telegram actively used in Ukraine and end-to-end encrypting messages, Russian intelligence agents establish contact, critically evaluate applicants, and even command activities through the channels that are unofficially open to everybody.
As Ukrainian security officials claimed, over 700 people were arrested since the spring of 2024 who took part in sabotage operations organized by the FSB and almost a quarter of them were underage. The recruits are usually lured to the monetary compensation of making low-risk surveillance that later turns out to high risk missions of setting terrorist bombs or raiding military and police installations.
Such a case happened in 2025 when a 16-year-old boy, Dnipro native, was detained because he chose to send photos of Ukrainian military sites to one of the FSB handlers through Telegram. It was believed that these images are to have been used in plotting a drone attack as they came across with coordinates. It represents one of the new tendencies toward remote-controlled acts of sabotage that do not involve any physical encounters and are fully planned and conducted with the help of digital means.
Recruitment Tactics and Psychological Manipulation
Identifying and Grooming Vulnerable Recruits
The recruitment strategies of the FSB on Telegram starts with recruitment of weak individuals. A situation such as economic difficulty, displacement and isolation that is characteristic of war-torn areas, provide good grounds upon which the masses can be manipulated. Telegram channels pretending to be job markets or nationalistic discussion groups are created to target and lure potential recruits adults usually unable to find employment or underage others under the pretext of providing paid labor tasks or conducting patriotic operations.
Initial engagement includes psychologically calibrated messaging, designed to build trust and reinforce commitment without raising alarm. Recruits are typically asked to complete minor tasks—photographing specific sites or placing graffiti with coded messages—as a form of initiation. This serves to normalize clandestine activity and gradually erode psychological resistance to more serious criminal acts.
As trust is established, recruits are directed to escalate their participation. Assignments evolve to include planting improvised explosive devices (IEDs), setting fires at government buildings, or even aiding in “double bomb” strategies where emergency responders are targeted following an initial explosion. Ukrainian officials note that these tactics, while deadly, also serve a symbolic function: demonstrating that Russia can maintain operational reach deep inside Ukrainian territory despite territorial losses.
Financial Incentives and Operational Secrecy
Payments promised via Telegram range from a few hundred to several thousand dollars, often contingent on proof of task completion. Recruits are rarely informed of the legal consequences or physical dangers involved. There have been confirmed fatalities among Ukrainian youth involved in such plots, often killed by premature detonation or targeted arrests.
The remote nature of coordination allows FSB handlers to maintain deniability while using individuals as disposable assets. Telegram’s privacy features, including anonymous usernames and channel forwarding, offer additional layers of protection for Russian operatives while hindering Ukrainian investigations.
Telegram’s Dual Role: Propaganda and Operational Infrastructure
Dissemination of Disinformation and War Narratives
Telegram also functions as a conduit for Russian propaganda in Ukraine. Numerous channels spread pro-Kremlin narratives, conspiracy theories, and demoralizing content intended to erode public trust in the Ukrainian government and military. These messages often blend factual reporting with manipulated media, creating confusion and feeding anti-government sentiment.
Some of these propaganda accounts are linked to recruitment pipelines. Individuals who engage with such content may later be approached through private messages, encouraged to act on their ideological alignment through “patriotic” missions or direct action against Ukrainian institutions.
These dual-purpose channels often pose as news or community platforms to build credibility before gradually transitioning into radical or operational spaces. Ukrainian authorities have noted that propaganda, when paired with financial desperation, has proven to be an effective mechanism for radicalization.
Encryption and Decentralization as Obstacles
The technical structure of telegram makes it difficult for Ukraine to counter those threats. The opposite of this is the case with Telegram, as its decentralization and high levels of encryption do not allow monitoring and censorship of content, similar to those seen on centralized platforms that collaborate with law enforcement agencies. It is possible to generate instant duplicates under new names even with groups being flagged or banned to a certain extent preserving operational continuity.
Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has tried to hamper such networks by breaking in on the channels, digital footprint, and suspicious activities. Nonetheless, the dimension of the issue and the technical precautions of the platform makes total elimination almost unrealistic.
Reporting and Countermeasures by Ukrainian Authorities
Ukrainian security officials have reacted in a two-pronged approach, including intelligence efforts, propaganda as well as citizen reporting devices. The results of one such project, the so-called Bust an FSB Agent chatbot, have received thousands of leads since their release at the end of 2024, allowing law enforcement to respond to suspicious activity on Telegram reported by civilians.
Increased arrests and legal proceedings against domestic collaborators have reinforced the state’s position that participation in FSB-linked activity will be met with serious penalties. Public campaigns are also focused on informing youth and vulnerable populations about the risks of engaging with anonymous online job offers or patriotic calls to sabotage.
Still, enforcement faces clear limitations. Recruitment using Telegram is fast and flexible; therefore, new threats appear quickly, exceeding the possibilities to neutralize them. Additional problems that Ukrainian authorities face with regard to digital crimes include shortages in the resources that they can use to address cybersecurity needs along with the difficulties of pursuing digital crimes that have transnational partners.
Strategic Implications and Broader Context
Hybrid Warfare and Asymmetric Strategy
Large range hybrid warfare is represented by the enforcement of Telegram in the Russian military and intelligence practice. The Kremlin has widened its tactical playbook in the territory of Ukraine by implementing a hybrid of more common assaults, psychological, computerized, and computerized methods. Digital recruitment and remote sabotage are used to instill fear, use up security resources and also perform civil functions away back in the lines.
Those approaches mark a change in the way intelligence is being conducted in the modern era, less in-person spies and more online proxies who can run operations with little-to-no training or direct contact. This method enables facilitating speedy multiplying and modification of the shifts in the conditions of the battlefield.
Societal Fragmentation and Post-Conflict Challenges
There are also long-term effects in social aspects of how Russia manipulates the youth in Ukraine using Telegram. The use of underage children in terrorism aggravates psychological trauma, corrupts the trust factor in the community, and makes reconciliation in the future difficult. Arrested youth have their families figuring issues of legal and emotional devastation, and they are mostly in the dark about the issue of the children being radicalized until the arrests.
The weaponisation of social space therefore ends up causing damage to a people in the form of generations and continuing to take away at the social fabric of a nation that is already dealing with the aftermath of a war. The short-term solution that will combat this dynamic is law enforcement, whereas the long-term strategy will be on the investments on education, mental health, and digital literacy.
Future Outlook on Telegram’s Role in Ukraine Conflict
In spite of the increased efforts to counter the tool, Telegram still appears to be the choice of Russian intelligence in Ukraine. Its security of communication and virality of content combined with its ability to integrate with the culture make it a perfect fit in covert operations in the contested environments. Although some bans or prohibitions can be discussed, it will be hard to implement them because of the infrastructure of Telegram and its popularity.
New technology like automated recruiting robots, geolocation masking and cross-platform propaganda formation will most likely make Russian activities more elusive. As a reaction, Ukraine might require more extensive collaboration with affiliated cyber organizations, compel design of platforms to be more forthcoming, and increase national technical capacity.
A cybersecurity analyst, observed that
“Telegram’s encrypted channels have become a critical vector for Russian intelligence to recruit, indoctrinate, and remotely command terrorist operations inside Ukraine, showcasing the evolving nature of 21st-century conflict.”
His remarks underscore the complex and fluid nature of digital conflict arenas where the boundaries between propaganda, espionage, and terrorism are increasingly indistinct.
Understanding Telegram’s operational and psychological roles is central to shaping Ukraine’s response. It is not merely a communication tool but a digital battlespace where influence, security, and identity intersect.
As war in Ukraine continues, the fight for digital dominance grows in parallel with kinetic operations. Telegram’s evolving place in Russian FSB strategy offers a case study in how modern conflicts are shaped as much by code and communication as by bullets and battalions. Addressing this reality demands a fusion of counterterrorism, cyber defense, and civic resilience tailored to the blurred frontlines of 21st-century warfare
