Non-Obvious Privacy Aspects When Sending Star Reactions

In August 2024, Telegram introduced the ability for users to send star reactions to channel posts, and in February 2025 — the ability to send such reactions not only on their own behalf, but also on behalf of any of their public channels.

The privacy settings for both types of reactions are not obvious. If you expect that no one will know your name, keep in mind the following:

1. When sending a paid reaction on your own behalf, the application allows you to disable the "Show me in Top Senders" option. If the user disables it, then neither their name nor their profile picture will be displayed to other channel subscribers, even if they are among the three donors who sent the most stars to the post.
However, even in this case, the owner of the channel to which the stars were sent will see the sender's name in the "Monetization" tab in the channel settings.

2. When sending a paid reaction, the application allows the user to select one of the public channels that they own. In this case, the list of the top 3 senders will not display the name of the sender, but the name of the channel that they chose.
However, the owner of the channel to which the stars were sent will see the sender's name in the "Monetization" tab in the channel settings. By comparing it with the list of top 3 senders of stars to a specific post, the channel owner can find out who exactly owns the channel on whose behalf the stars were sent.

Be careful: Telegram applications do not warn users sending star reactions about these nuances.

#reactions #stars #privacy