According to anti-fraud systems, between 15% to 35% of subscribers in popular Telegram channels may be bots. In highly competitive niches (crypto, finance, business), this figure can sometimes reach 50%.
Advertisers lose up to 40% of their budgets due to manipulations, while channel owners risk not only their reputation but also account suspension by Telegram. In this guide, we will explore the methods used by malicious actors, how to distinguish regular bots from AI-driven ones, and the tools that can help secure your channel even before an attack begins.
The Dangers of Manipulations for Channel Owners
Many administrators mistakenly believe that inflated subscribers are just "dead weight" that does not interfere. In reality, the damage from bots is much more serious.
First and foremost, trust from advertisers declines. Today, even a small channel is checked through exchanges or manually analyzes statistics before buying ads. If post views do not match the subscriber count, if chat activity is zero, and if audience growth looks unnatural — this is a signal that the channel is manipulated. The advertiser will either refuse to place an ad or will pay significantly less.
Moreover, bots can trigger account suspension. Telegram periodically purges accounts suspected of dishonest activity. If several thousand blatant bots are subscribed to a channel, algorithms may consider the channel itself a spam tool.
In such a case, suspension is just a matter of time.
Another problem is the distortion of real statistics. You stop understanding what content is truly interesting to real people. Subscriber growth says nothing about quality, and analytics turns into meaningless figures. This hampers both promotion and monetization.
Finally, there are reputational risks. Lists of 'spam' channels spread quickly in professional communities. If your channel gets on such a list, restoring trust will be extremely difficult.
Why bots are inflated
To defend effectively, it's essential to understand the motives of attackers. Most often, competitors order inflations: bots are mass-subscribed to a rival channel to spoil its statistics and make it unattractive for advertisers.
This is a method of black PR.
Another common scenario involves freelancers and questionable services that promise rapid audience growth but actually inflate cheap bots to report back to the client. The client sees a pretty number of subscribers, but after a month the channel turns into a shell.
Some channel owners order inflations themselves, trying to save money and deceive advertisers. This usually ends poorly—advertisers quickly catch the fraud. There are also automated spam attacks: bots are subscribed to later use the channel for spam distribution in comments or for phishing.
In all cases, the goal is the same—to either harm or artificially inflate metrics. And while in the short term inflation can create the appearance of success, in the long run, it kills the channel.
Types of bots
Bots come in various forms, and methods to combat them differ. Today, we can distinguish two main types: regular bots and neurobots.
Regular bots — these are simple scripts or accounts created in bulk. They often have random names with numbers, lack avatars or have standard images, display zero activity (they don’t read posts, don’t interact) and subscribe to hundreds of channels at once. Such bots can be easily identified visually, and analytics services can detect them based on characteristic patterns. Ordinary bots are cheap and used for blatant manipulation.
Neurobots — these are accounts managed by neural networks. They mimic the behavior of real people: they can react, write meaningful comments
(neurocommenting), subscribe to channels with pauses, and change avatars. They are harder to distinguish from live users, especially when using a modern language model. Neurobots are created for more subtle attacks: they can lurk in a channel for years without raising suspicion, and then activate to spread spam or inflate views. The rise of such bots poses a challenge for all administrators.
Services for combating manipulation
While it's impossible to completely eliminate risk, there are tools that help identify and remove bots, as well as prevent their emergence.
First and foremost, there are specialized anti-spam bots. For example, Combat Bot (@CombatBot) analyzes new subscribers and blocks suspicious accounts, allowing for customizable verification strictness. Shieldy (@shieldy_bot) was initially created to protect chats from spam but can also be used for channels with comment restrictions.
Analytical platforms are also useful. TGStat and Telemetr provide data on subscriber growth, engagement rate (ER), and the ratio of views to subscribers. If you notice a sudden spike without any visible reason — that's reason to check for a potential attack.
It's also important to mention fraud filtering in advertising networks. AdsGram, being an advertising network within Telegram, employs algorithmic fraud filtering when displaying ads. This means that if you place ads through AdsGram, the system automatically filters out low-quality traffic and bots, protecting the advertiser from unnecessary costs and the channel owner from suspicious subscribers. Transparent statistics and quality control are part of the platform.
Don’t forget about manual checks. You can periodically export the subscriber list (via parsers) and check them manually or through specialized services.
However, this is labor-intensive if the audience is large.
How to secure the channel in advance
Prevention is always more effective than dealing with the consequences. Here’s what you can do today.
Privacy and policy settings.Enable membership restrictions: for example, ban accounts younger than a week or accounts without an avatar. This will cut off a portion of cheap bots. Use CAPTCHA for membership via a bot — many anti-spam bots offer verification. In chats, set up anti-flood measures and limit links.
Activity monitoring.Monitor statistics daily. Use TGStat or Telegram's built-in analytics (for channels with subscriptions). Pay attention to anomalies. Check the activity in comments: if similar messages are coming from accounts with suspicious names, these could be neurobots.
Enable slow mode in the chat so that spammers can't overwhelm the feed.
Using professional tools.Connect one of the bots for protection (Shieldy, Combat Bot) and configure it for your channel. If you're running ad campaigns, prefer trusted ad networks like AdsGram, which already incorporate bot filtering.
Training administrators.If you have a team, explain to them how to identify suspicious accounts and what to do if they suspect an attack.
Create an action checklist for a sudden increase in followers.
What (not) to do if you notice an artificial spike on your channel.
Even with the best protection, an attack may break through. The key is to stay calm and act systematically.
First, document the data: take screenshots of the statistics, save the logs. This will be useful if you want to contact Telegram support or file complaints with advertisers. Then analyze the source: where did the bots come from? It could be the result of a failed advertising campaign or a targeted attack from competitors.
After that, initiate a cleanup: use bots to remove suspicious accounts. You can temporarily close the channel (make it private) to stop the influx, and then reopen it. Be sure to check your advertising campaigns. If you purchased ads, reach out to the platform. AdsGram, for example, provides detailed statistics and can help determine if there was fraud from a specific source.
And finally, strengthen your protection: after an attack, revisit your settings, and consider adding additional layers of verification.
Now, let's discuss what not to do. Don't buy ads on suspicious exchanges in an attempt to "overpower" the bots with real followers — this will only worsen the situation. Don't ignore the problem: bots tend to multiply and attract even more spam. Don't delete everything manually if you're not sure — you could accidentally ban real followers. And under no circumstances engage in negotiations with the attackers:
often they are fraudsters who promise to remove the bots after payment, but only intensify the attack.
Conclusion
Protecting your channel from bot traffic and neuro-commenting is not a one-time task, but an ongoing process. The Telegram advertising market is growing, and alongside it, the methods of fraud are evolving. Today, it's no longer enough for an administrator to just publish content: you need to master analytical tools, understand bot behavior, and be able to respond quickly to threats.
The key takeaway: security is built on three pillars — proactive settings, regular monitoring, and the use of professional services. Advertising platforms like AdsGram take on part of the work in filtering out low-quality traffic, which reduces risks for both channel owners and advertisers. An approach based on automation and transparent statistics allows you to focus on project development rather than on combating the consequences of attacks.
