Telegram Privacy Settings for Crypto Users: A Step-by-Step Lockdown

When you join a public crypto group on Telegram, everyone in it can tap your name. Depending on your settings, they can see your phone number, your photo, when you were last online, and add you to whatever group they like. In most chats that’s harmless. In crypto chats, some of those people are looking for targets.

This guide walks through the settings worth changing, in the order they appear in the app. It takes about ten minutes. It’s part of our guide to finding good crypto Telegram channels.

Everything below lives under Settings → Privacy and Security. On Telegram Desktop, open the menu (three lines), then Settings. Menu names shift a little between iOS, Android, Desktop and versions, so if a label is slightly different, look for the closest match.

Part 1: Security

Two-Step Verification

This is the most important setting on the page. By default, logging in to Telegram on a new device only needs a code sent by SMS or to your other Telegram sessions. If someone gets that code, by tricking you or by taking over your phone number, they get your account.

With Two-Step Verification on, they also need a password.

1. Tap Two-Step Verification.
2. Set a password you don’t use anywhere else. A long passphrase is easier to remember than a short complex one.
3. Skip the hint, or make it useless to anyone but you.
4. Add a recovery email, and make sure that email account is protected with its own strong password and two-factor login.

Write the password down somewhere offline. If you lose it and the recovery email, getting back in is painful.

Passkeys

Telegram added passkey login in December 2025. A passkey lets you log in with your device’s PIN, fingerprint or face scan instead of an SMS code, which takes the “steal the SMS code” route off the table.

1. Tap Passkeys (if you don’t see it, update the app; it may not be available on every version yet).
2. Add a passkey and confirm with your device lock.

Your passkey is stored on your device and can sync through a password manager like iCloud Keychain or Google Password Manager. If you have Two-Step Verification on, Telegram still asks for that password when you log in with a passkey. Keep your account registered to a phone number you control, since SMS login remains a fallback.

Active Sessions

Tap Active Sessions (on some versions, Devices). You’ll see every device logged in to your account, with location and last activity.

• Terminate anything you don’t recognise.
• Use Terminate all other sessions if you’re unsure.
• Set automatically terminate old sessions to a shorter period, such as one month.

Check this again any time you’ve logged in on a shared computer or think you might have entered a code somewhere you shouldn’t.

Passcode Lock

Passcode Lock (or Passcode & Face ID) locks the Telegram app itself on your device after a period of inactivity. Useful if your phone is ever in someone else’s hands. Use a different code from your phone’s unlock code.

Part 2: Privacy

Phone Number

This one matters a lot in crypto groups. Your phone number is often connected to your real identity and to SMS-based logins elsewhere.

• Who can see my phone number: Nobody.
• Who can find me by my number: My Contacts.

People who already have your number saved will still see it. That’s fine. What you’re stopping is strangers in groups seeing it.

Before you do this, make sure you have a username set (Settings → your profile → Username) so people you want to reach you still can.

Last Seen & Online

Set to Nobody or My Contacts. Scammers sometimes time messages for when you’re online and likely to reply quickly. Note the trade-off: Telegram hides other people’s last seen from you if you hide yours, unless you have Premium.

Profile Photos

This is a judgment call. Hiding your photo from strangers protects your privacy. Some security guides suggest the opposite: keeping it visible so people can compare you against impersonators using a copy. If you run or moderate a group, keep it visible. If you’re a regular member, My Contacts is reasonable.

Forwarded Messages

Set Who can add a link to my account when forwarding my messages to Nobody. Otherwise, when someone forwards a message you wrote in a group, it carries a link back to your profile, and a stranger in another chat can find you.

Calls

Set Who can call me to My Contacts or Nobody. Under the same menu, set peer-to-peer to Nobody or My Contacts. Peer-to-peer calls connect you directly with the caller, which can reveal your IP address to them.

Groups and channels (or “Invites”)

Set Who can add me to groups and channels to My Contacts.

This stops a common trick: being added, without asking, to a “support” group or a fake VIP group full of accounts that all vouch for each other. With this set, strangers can only send you an invite link, which you can ignore.

Messages

Recent versions of Telegram include options for who can start a new private chat with you, and for filtering chats from strangers. Some of these options need Telegram Premium, and the exact choices depend on your app version. If you can, limit new messages to contacts or have chats from unknown accounts filtered.

Even without that, when someone outside your contacts messages you, Telegram shows block and report options at the top of the chat. Use them.

Bio and Date of Birth

Set these to My Contacts or Nobody. A birthday is a classic security-question answer, and a bio that says where you work or what you hold is free information for anyone building a story to scam you.

Part 3: Habits that settings can’t fix

Don’t post your holdings or problems in public chats. “My 2 BTC withdrawal is stuck” is a magnet for fake support. Ask “Is support responding today?” instead. More on that in the “admin will DM you” scam.

Think about a separate account for crypto groups. Telegram allows several accounts in one app (Settings → add account). Using a second account, registered to a second number, for public crypto chats keeps your personal contacts and main identity out of reach of people you don’t know.

Never send a login code to anyone. Telegram’s own service account is marked as official and will never ask you to forward a code. Anyone asking for one is trying to take your account.

Be careful with bots and mini-apps. A bot can’t see your phone number unless you share it, but some ask. Mini-apps can ask to connect a wallet. Read crypto Telegram bots and what never to give them and Telegram mini-app airdrop safety.

Keep your wallet setup separate too. Account privacy protects your identity. A burner wallet for airdrops protects your funds when a link turns out to be malicious.

The checklist

Setting	Recommended for crypto groups
Two-Step Verification	On, unique password, recovery email
Passkeys	Add one if available
Active Sessions	Review, terminate unknowns, auto-terminate after 1 month
Phone Number	Nobody can see; My Contacts can find
Last Seen & Online	My Contacts or Nobody
Forwarded Messages	Nobody
Calls / peer-to-peer	My Contacts or Nobody
Groups and channels / Invites	My Contacts
Messages from strangers	Restrict or filter where available
Bio, Date of Birth	My Contacts or Nobody

Do it once, check Active Sessions every few months, and you’ll have closed most of the gaps that crypto scammers on Telegram rely on.

When you’re ready to find channels worth joining, start with the education category or our top lists.

Part of our series on crypto Telegram. Start with the overview: How to Find Good Crypto Telegram Channels (and Skip the Junk).