Removed from OTT, still everywhere: How Telegram keeps Satluj online
"Hun Ni Rukni Film. Khalra Saab Di Avaaz Nu Koi Ni Dabaa Sakda" ("Now the film will not be stopped. No one can silence Khalra
"Hun Ni Rukni Film. Khalra Saab Di Avaaz Nu Koi Ni Dabaa Sakda" ("Now the film will not be stopped. No one can silence Khalra Sahib's voice"). That was actor Diljit Dosanjh's message on X after his film Satluj was removed from the OTT platform ZEE5. India Today found a Telegram piracy network pushing “Satluj” after its OTT removal with 37 channels and bots used to deliver, promote and retrieve pirated copies of the film Read Full Story In many ways, that is exactly what is happening. While the film is no longer available on its official streaming platform, it continues to circulate online. Pirated copies are readily accessible through a simple Google search and, more prominently, on Telegram, where channels continue to distribute the film. While taking the film off an OTT platform is relatively straightforward, containing it after release is far harder. Once a copy enters Telegram’s distribution chain, it no longer sits under a single point of control. The file moves through channels, bots, backup groups and third-party links, leaving neither the publisher nor regulators with full control over where it travels next. A simple Telegram search led users into a bot-driven piracy chain: search, start, forced join, download. The film’s circulation on Telegram is wide. India Today identified at least 37 public channels, groups connected to its piracy trail by querying Telegram’s API for indexed spaces carrying the film’s name and related keywords. Each result was then manually verified to filter out dead links, spam and irrelevant groups, leaving only those actively sharing pirated copies or redirecting users to external download links.
The Telegram piracy network identified by India Today had over 12.6 lakh subscribers across channels sharing links to the Dosanjh film. Almost every channel had a bot associated with it. But the bots did not move alike. Some delivered, some diverted, some quietly regenerated links, all working to keep the network just out of Telegram’s reach. One channel alone had 10 lakh subscribers. It used a content-delivery bot to push links to its members and to anyone searching for the film. Users were typically directed to a bot that required a "/start" command and, in many cases, forced joins to one or more Telegram channels before providing download links in multiple resolutions. In these cases, the channels carried no visible messages, leaving little public trail for Telegram’s moderation systems to flag. At least 33 of the 37 channels identified used this type of content-delivery bot. Other channels had different types of bots, including promotion bots that redirected users to piracy channels, helping operators expand and retain their audience. One dynamic retrieval bot allowed users to search for “Satluj” and instantly receive the pirated copy without browsing through multiple channels. The findings mirror a broader trend documented in a recent study by researchers from Louisiana State University and the University of Texas at Arlington. After analysing 1,057 piracy channels and more than 209,000 posts, the researchers found that Telegram's video piracy ecosystem is deliberately engineered to withstand takedowns by relying on interconnected bots, backup channels and multistage redirection instead of a single distribution point.
The BriefWire