What a Telegram moderation bot should actually do
A checklist for picking a moderator: rights, filters that survive tricks, graded penalties and an appealable log.
Choosing a bot usually starts with feature lists. Starting from requirements works better — it shows what is missing.
The minimum without which nothing works
Seeing messages. The bot must be an admin with the right to delete messages, and its privacy mode must be off. Otherwise it receives only commands and stays silent on spam — reason number one behind “the bot does not work”.
Deleting and restricting. The right to delete messages and to ban members. Without the second, the best it can do is erase a message while the spammer continues.
What separates a good moderator
Filters that survive letter swaps. “Casino” arrives as “cаsino” with a Cyrillic “а”, with zero-width characters inside, with different endings. The filter must normalise text before comparing.
An entry check. A button or a small maths problem stops bots before the first message — cheaper than cleaning the chat afterwards.
Graded penalties. Warning, mute, ban. An instant ban for the first word turns a chat into a barracks.
A log that explains. What was deleted, why, by which rule — and a “not spam” button that undoes it. Moderation without appeal guarantees conflicts.
Quiet hours. The bot goes silent at night while moderation keeps working.
What is usually missing
Publishing: moderators and schedulers normally live in different bots, although an announcement in a group is the same task as a channel post. Here they share one place — see moderation.