I'm not saying that censorship hasn't happened, and I'm not saying I think it should. What I'm saying is that there are a bunch of related groups who are very misinformed about free speech and censorship, and they seem to have flocked to Telegram.
If this stat is to be trusted Telegram is the 2nd most popular messaging app in the UK. There must be an awful lot of anti-lockdown protestors, anti-vax groups, anti-semitic, far-right, and so on in that country to make is so popular.
By the way, where do the far-left extremists go for their messaging needs? Are they on Whatsapp? Signal? Telegram maybe? I may have missed something but for some reason you only seem to list groups which in the media are labelled 'right' or (as you stated) 'far-right'.
Secondly, I think there are methodological issues with that analysis. Measuring by App Store categories is hard to do accurately, only presents a snapshot in time, its numbers that fluctuate a lot, and it only represents new user acquisition, not active user growth. I wouldn't trust this number at all without more information. Anecdotally, I don't know anyone who uses Telegram, although I do know many people who downloaded it once.
> where do the far-left extremists go
This isn't really something we have a problem with in the UK. I'm sure there are some, but the bulk of our issues are growing far-right, nationalist, and/or authoritarian groups. I don't think a debate over terms is going to be productive, and as this is your third account you might want to be careful with it!
Are we talking about the same United Kingdom as the one where Yougov has been doing polls on the subject of extremism [1]? If so I wonder what gives you the impression that the bulk of [y]our issues are growing far-right, nationalist, and/or authoritarian groups given that those who answered those polls come up with the following ranking:
#1 islamic extremism (58%)
#2 right-wing extremism (31%)
#2 left-wing extremism (23%)
Unsurprisingly the results differ widely based upon the political affiliation of the interviewee with left-wing voters placing larger emphasis on right-wing extremism while right-wing voters do the opposite. Nevertheless, left-wing extremism seems to be almost as 'popular' as the right-wing version while both are far less 'popular' than islamic extremism.
[1] https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2021/0...
Here's a recent report on left-wing extremism in the United Kingdom:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
I have not found a similar study on far-right extremism but there is a report giving an overview of the far right:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
Reading these reports shows that political violence currently is at a low level in the UK but that it is on the rise internationally which has the potential to lead to an increase both on the far-left as well as the far-right side.
Section 3 of the link breaks down how many people have been identified as at risk from particular ideologies.
'Mixed, unstable or unclear' accounts for 51%.
Islamic extremism is 24%.
Right-wing extremism is 22%.
Left wing extremism is less than 3%.
So, the data aligns well with what the original commentator was suggesting.
[0] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/individuals-referre...