The incident follows a similar suspension in 2018, when Apple temporarily pulled Telegram for material the appâs founder Pavel Durov called âinappropriate contentâ at the time, only to be restored after Telegram beefed up safeguards.
An Apple spokesperson confirmed the recent brief removal, saying its review found content that violated guidelines prohibiting child sexual abuse material.
âThe app was subsequently restored after the developer promptly removed the content and banned the user who posted it,â the spokesperson added.
The app was removed and restored on the same day, after Telegram took action.
Telegram, which has more than a billion monthly active users, says it has a zero-tolerance policy for material on child sexual abuse, blocking nearly 338,000 groups and channels over such items this year.
âIâm sure this stance will be applied equally to all other apps in the store, in the future, right? Apple,â Telegram posted on X in response to a user who shared the Apple statement.
Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Fornite-maker Epic Games, which has been embroiled in legal challenges with Apple for years, questioned the U.S. tech giantâs decision.
âApple has stated they removed the app from availability to a billion users because a Telegram user posted something horrible and illegal,â Sweeney wrote on X.
âThey did not elaborate on how, if that is the standard for app removal, any communications app could operate at scale, including iMessage.â
An Apple spokesperson did not respond to a request for further comment on the guideline violation.
Telegram has drawn regulatory scrutiny for its handling of child sexual abuse material and other illegal content as recently as April, when Britainâs Ofcom launched an investigation into evidence suggesting sharing of child sex abuse material.
Telegram has âcategoricallyâ denied the communications regulatorâs accusations, adding that since 2018 it had âvirtually eliminatedâ the public spread of child sexual abuse material through detection algorithms.
Telegram was also fined in February by Australiaâs online safety regulator for delaying answers to queries on measures taken to rein in material on child abuse and violent extremist behaviour.
(Reporting by Rishabh Jaiswal in Bengaluru and Mrinmay Dey in Mexico City; Editing by Christopher Cushing, Edwina Gibbs and Clarence Fernandez)