After confirming, Telegram will remove Dutch bang lists

Telegram has still removed banga lists from the platform containing the names and phone numbers of Dutch women. This is what Offlimits, the online abuse knowledge centre, says. Previously, the Telegram messaging app did not want to cooperate with the removal.

At the request of Offlimits and the Victim Support Fund, Telegram has reversed that decision. “We submitted a transfer request already in March,” said Offlimits director Robbert Hoving News NOS Radio 1. The club did not receive any response to that. In the end, the group issued an enforcement notice stating that Telegram broke the law with the banga lists.

Offlimits finally got an answer after Telegram’s founder was arrested in France. That country believes that the app offers too much space for criminals.

“Eventually this led to the listings being offline now,” says director Hoving. According to Hoving, Telegram also wants to start a channel with the knowledge center in which Offlimits can report content that is penal or illegal.

Seven months ago a banga list appeared in Utrecht and was shared among students. It contained photos and personal information of women from the Utrecht Student Group, who were judged on their appearance and performance in bed. That list also ended up on Telegram.

The consequences for the women on the list were dire. In June the father of a woman on the list said that some students are talking to a psychologist, have moved from Utrecht or stopped their studies.

Several bad things have happened to the students whose addresses have been shared, the father said. “That a car is parked in front of their house, the window goes down and the driver says: You’re so and so, aren’t you? I know where you live, you you’re a hottie.”

Ina Brouwer, the lawyer for the Utrecht students, tells the ANP news agency that the lists are indeed no longer visible in public Dutch Telegram groups.

However, she is uncertain about what happens in non-public organizations. “You can sometimes see from the name of a closed group that banga lists are shared there. Telegram has taken the first step. We are now going to see what is needed to clean Telegram further forward.”