Channels (Telegram) silently disabled by tengu_harbor feature flag — paying Max subscriber locked out

Summary

Channels feature (Telegram integration) stopped working silently. The tengu_harbor feature flag is set to false server-side, which blocks ALL inbound channel messages. No announcement, no warning, no deprecation notice. Everything looks like it's working — MCP connects, banner says "Listening for channel messages" — but messages never arrive.

Environment

• Claude Code version: 2.1.100 (native binary, Linux x86_64)
• OS: Ubuntu 24.04, Hetzner VPS
• Subscription: Claude Max (paying subscriber)
• Plugin: telegram@claude-plugins-official v0.0.4
• Last working: April 10, 2026 ~12:49 CEST
• Stopped working: April 10, 2026 — same day, no config changes on my side

Symptoms

1. claude --channels plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official starts normally
2. Banner displays: "Listening for channel messages from: plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official"
3. Telegram MCP server connects successfully (debug log confirms Successfully connected (transport: stdio) in 218ms)
4. MCP server disconnects after 6-8 seconds (UNKNOWN connection closed after 8s (cleanly))
5. No inbound messages are delivered — complete silence
6. Telegram Bot API confirms messages ARE queued (getUpdates returns them)
7. Outbound tools (reply, react) are still registered in permissions

Debug log evidence

2026-04-10T16:48:54.794Z [WARN] auto mode disabled: tengu_auto_mode_config.enabled === "disabled" (circuit breaker)
2026-04-10T16:48:55.027Z [DEBUG] MCP server "plugin:telegram:telegram": Successfully connected (transport: stdio) in 257ms
2026-04-10T16:49:01.266Z [DEBUG] MCP server "plugin:telegram:telegram": UNKNOWN connection closed after 6s (cleanly)

Root cause (from binary analysis)

The gate function K_$ checks mjH() (which reads tengu_harbor from GrowthBook) at step 2 — before any other validation. When the flag is false, the function returns {action: "skip", kind: "disabled", reason: "channels feature is not currently available"} and drops the connection.

--dangerously-load-development-channels does NOT bypass this check — it only skips the allowlist validation at step 4+. The feature flag at step 2 blocks everything regardless.

What I tried

• [x] Restarting Claude Code session
• [x] Reinstalling plugin
• [x] Using --dangerously-load-development-channels server:telegram
• [x] Enabling plugin in enabledPlugins settings
• [x] Running with --debug to trace the issue
• [x] Verifying Telegram Bot API works (messages are queued, token is valid)
• [x] Checking CLAUDE_CODE_DISABLE_NONESSENTIAL_TRAFFIC is not set

Nothing helps because the block is server-side.

Impact

I'm a paying Claude Max subscriber who migrated from a third-party Telegram integration (OpenClaw) to Anthropic's official Channels solution, trusting it would be supported. I deleted OpenClaw and restructured my entire workflow around Channels.

Now:

• My Telegram bot is dead with zero warning
• I have no fallback — the old integration is gone
• The feature appears to work (no error messages!) but silently drops all inbound messages
• Hours spent debugging what turned out to be a server-side kill switch

Request

1. Re-enable tengu_harbor for Max subscribers — or at minimum provide a way to opt in
2. If Channels is being deprecated, announce it — don't silently disable a feature people depend on
3. Show an actual error message when the feature flag is disabled instead of pretending to listen
4. Don't gate paid features behind unstable feature flags that can be toggled without notice

Related issues

• #46299 — Channels feature silently disabled by tengu_harbor flag
• #45985 — Telegram MCP server disconnects after 5s
• #45918 — DISABLE_NONESSENTIAL_TRAFFIC blocks feature flags
• #35832 — tengu circuit breaker
• #36503 — Original channels reliability thread