According to a report from TechCrunch, the social media platform Telegram will auction handles for individual accounts and channels. The company has been taking steps to boost its revenue. Earlier this year, it announced a subscription plan to keep its finance afloat. 

The TON blockchain will support the username auction, the network launched by the team behind Telegram resurrected by a community of volunteers. Similar to Ethereum Name Service, the project that allows people and entities to own unique handles, Telegram users can purchase their own or other handles. 

In that way, people can prevent bad actors from impersonating them, giving users further control over their identities and data. Telegram launched its TON blockchain project over three years ago, but regulators pressured it to halt it. 

As mentioned, the community took over the project. The founder team behind Telegram has denied involvement with the blockchain to prevent further escalation with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 

Telegram Embraces Web3 Features

According to Techcrunch, Durov wants to add a “little bit of Web 3.0 to Telegram in the coming weeks.” The social media founder was allegedly surprised by the TON Foundation, the entity behind developing and maintaining this blockchain auction of domain names. 

During these events, several domain names sold for around $250,000, including Wallet.ton and casino.ton, according to the report. Telegram founder Pavel Durov said:

I’m really impressed by the success of the auction TON recently conducted for their domain/wallet names. Wallet.ton was sold for 215,250 Toncoin (~$260000) while casino.ton was sold for ~$244000. If TON has been able to achieve these results, imagine how successful Telegram with its 700 million users could be if we put reserved @ usernames, group and channel links for auction.

The former will launch its auction on a different website to put distance between Telegram and the TON blockchain auction. Techcrunch claims that users can log into the site with their Telegram usernames. 

Therein, they can link their accounts to the handles that they own. During the auction, people can purchase handles with four to five characters. The event will be public. Everyone can participate and auction their usernames. Andrew Rogozov, the Founding member of the TON Foundation, added: 

For the first time, social media users will be able to transparently prove that they own their handles thanks to their tokenisation on the TON blockchain.

Social Media Seek More Revenue

Telegram has over 700 million registered users. Thus, the social media’s founder believes this auction will be successful. Bitcoinist reported that the TON domain sale made over 2,392,002 in Toncoin or over $2 million. 

Telegram is one of the social media platforms embracing crypto. Reddit recently launched non-fungible tokens (NFTs) for its users. The digital assets saw wide adoption and are considered a success. It remains to be seen if the TON-based auction will see equal success.