- Vietnam has issued an order to block telegram for not cooperating with authorities in stopping crimes
- According to authorities, nearly 70% of telegram -channels contain and groups in Vietnam harmful content
- A new law requires providers of social media to store Vietnamese user’s data and share them with authorities upon request
Vietnam has blocked telegram not to cooperate with the authorities to stop crimes that allegedly happen on the platform.
As reported by Pakinomist, the country’s leader of the telecom department issued the blocking order against telecommunications companies on May 21, 2025, with an obligation to report back to the Ministry by June 2.
While the block did not take effect immediately, Telegram appears to be inaccessible from the country at the time of writing. This means that anyone living in or visiting Vietnam now needs one of the best VPN services to keep access to the popular messaging app from the country.
Vietnam Telegram Block
According to international and local sources, Vietnamese police said that nearly 70% of the nearly 10,000 telegram channels and groups available in the country contain “toxic and bad information”, Al Jazeera reported. Some groups have even been shown to have relations with illegal activities, such as drug trafficking or terrorism.
This is why the authorities decided to place an order to all the country’s telecommunications providers “to implement solutions and measures to prevent Telegram’s activities in Vietnam.”
When he spoke with Pakinomist, a Telegram spokesman is said to be “surprised by these statements” and added that the team responded to legal requests from Vietnam on time.
According to what a government official told Pakinomist, Telegram could not share user data with the authorities as they were asked as required by the law.
Vietnam actually enforced a controversial law last December that requires social media providers to store Vietnamese user’s data and share them with the authorities upon request. However, according to Surfshark’s data, Vietnam had already limited social media twice before that, with temporary blocks on Facebook and Instagram in 2016.
Telegram CEO Pavel Durov was arrested in August 2024 in France, among other things, not to moderate the app correctly to combat crimes that occurred on the platform. Then Telegram appears to have strengthened its moderation policies.
Globally, Surfshark registered a total of 34 countries that have banned telegram since 2015, either temporarily or permanently, where Vietnam was the 35th to do so.
How a VPN can help
Some local journalists and internet users lamented difficulties in accessing telegram from Vietnam without a VPN that started from May 25, 2025.
Local users also confirmed Techradar that telegram is blocked in the country at the time of writing, but VPNs continue to work well to bypass restrictions.
This is because VPN services and the like circumvention of tools come with IP-spoofing capabilities that allow users to look like they are reviewing from another country completely within a few clicks.
All you have to do is download a reliable VPN to Vietnam, select a server in a country where Telegram is not blocked and continue to use the app as usual. You can find all the updated information on how to unlock Telegram with a VPN on our dedicated page.
If you are not willing to invest some money in a premium service, I recommend checking our free VPN page to choose the most secure freebie out there. Tor Browser is also a great alernative to remain anonymous and bypass Internet Cenrsohip at no cost.
