Private PreviewGram

Run away from Metadata

[⚠️] - Warning:
USE A VPN TO HIDE YOUR IP
IT'S IN TEST
PreviewGram is under LGPL License
Application's theme from UN-GCPDS/qt-material under BSD-2-Clause License.

Why use?

PreviewGram is for users that wants get a more private experience with the Telegram's Channel. It's because:

  • Telegram collects when you see determinate content
  • Groups show publicly who are the followers*
  • The channel owners can see who are them followers
  • Telegram added Group Read Receipts*
  • You must to trust on Telegram's Servers
  • * PreviewGram doesn't protects you against it, because can't view Group Chats.
[⚠️] - Warning
If you don't enabled Github's JavaScript, go to Telegram Privacy Issues Topic to understand more.

How to install

> pip install -r requirements.txt
> py -m build
> pip install dist/Private\ PreviewGram-1.1.tar.gz
[⚠️] - Note
If you're in another version, change the 1.1 for the current version.

Or Download Last Release

Running without install

  • Clone this project
git clone https://github.com/RickBarretto/PreviewGram.git

Or Download Source Code

On repository folder, run:

pip -m test_application.py

Features

PreviewGram Screenshot

PreviewGram protects you when:

  • Disables JavaScript when Browsing
  • Doesn't store cookies
  • Doesn't run trackers
  • Uses a generic Chrome user-agent
  • Doesn't use Telegram's API
  • Doesn't require a Account

Useful Features:

  • Store locally your favorites Channels
  • Can't open some links

Limitations

PreviewGram isn't the perfection on Earth. Because:

  1. Doesn't use JavaScript
  2. It's limited by the Telegram's Preview Site itself.

So, PreviewGram can't:

  • Hide your IP*
  • Play videos**
  • See Group Chats***
  • Download files directly*** (instead this, do: RMB**** > Copy link address and download on Telegram App)

Tips

  • Always use Vpn or Proxy
  • To open links, do RMB* > Copy link address
  • If you want to watch videos, please use Tor** (or any Browser that you trust)
  • Click on Test privacy! button to test for yourself. It's tested by What Is My Browser***
Extra: Accessing channels through TorBrowser
Go to Accessing via Tor topic.

VPN, Proxy and Tor

Differences

Proxy

Proxy is your online ID, hiding you real IP Address. It's a intermediary between your Web Browser and the internet, a web site for example. (Needs to be configured per-app basis)

VPN

VPN covers 100% of you device traffic, encrypting the connection. It'll hide your real IP Address.

The Onion Route (Tor)

Tor anonymizes your traffic sending it through a series of proxies, this proxies are called Nodes, that encrypts the traffic and sends to destiny using a Exit Node.
Sources:

The Tor's Power

With and Without Tor:

Tor: off / Https: off Tor: off / Https: on Tor: on / Https: on
Tor: off / Https: off Tor: off / Https: on Tor: on / Https: on
Source: When I'm using Tor, can eavesdroppers still see the information I share with websites, like login information and things I type into forms?

Why PreviewGram doesn't use Tor's Proxy by itself?

Tor have some issues, and aren't recommended to use Tor outside TorBrowser to avoid DNS Leaks and VPN+TOR issues.

Sources:

But What The F??? talking about Tor, if PreviewGram doesn't use it???

Because you can Access the channels via Tor
Yep, you don't need this application if you have Tor... ?

Accessing via Tor

  1. Create a "Telegram Channels" Folder on Bookmarks
Create Folder
  1. To access your favorite channel, put a /s/ between the domain and channel name, example: https://t.me/previewgram to https://t.me/s/previewgram
  2. Save to "Telegram Channels"'s Bookmark Folder
Save to BookMark
  1. Access when you want!
  2. Extra: make Tor portable and use the Mobile Tor Browser to use everywhere.
Sources:

Help PreviewGram

If you're a Dev (or not), help PreviewGram forking and making pull requests. Don't afraid to use the Github's Issue Tab to make critics, suggestions, bugs and security reports! ?

To Do

  • [ ] Block telegram.org and other https requests using the webView.page().profile().setUrlRequestInterceptor(interceptor) (Thanks, dbunk!)
  • [ ] Channel Categories
  • [ ] Open on Tor
  • [ ] UI improvements?

Telegram Privacy Issues

As any Social Network app, Telegram suffers with Osint (Open-Source Intelligence), be caution with the information that you exposes publicly about yourself!

Osint Problems:

What is Osint?

Yeah, it's the information era, 500 milions tweets are published every day. Public informations like birthday, complete name, age are available on internet published by its own users. Which in itself poses privacy risks.

"Open-source intelligence (OSINT) is a multi-factor (qualitative, quantitative) methodology for collecting, analyzing and making decisions about data accessible in publicly available sources to be used in an intelligence context."
Source: Open-Source Intelligence - Wikiless

So, caution with your public information! ?

Articles:

GitHub - RickBarretto/PreviewGram at pythonawesome.com
PreviewGram is for users that wants get a more private experience with the Telegram’s Channel. - GitHub - RickBarretto/PreviewGram at pythonawesome.com
GitHubRickBarretto