French Justice’s ‘prosecution’ for Pavel Durov’s Telegram: No ‘block’ in fraud, drugs and even terrorism

‘ It does not prevent users from dealing drugs, organised crime and is generally one that is much used for illegal activities”, denounces French justice for Russian . The application of exchange of encrypted Telegram messages has caused many reactions due to the freedom it offers its users. The founder and its head, Russian-born Pavel Durov, was arrested yesterday Saturday (24.08.2024) at night in France for various violations to which the platform has been subjected. Telegram, created in 2013, measures nearly 900 million users and is expected to exceed the limit of one billion active users monthly the following year, Durov had pointed out in an interview he had given in April to American journalist Tucker Carlson. People appreciate “the independence, respect for privacy and freedom” of the platform, he had added. Telegram is at the counterweight of its American opponents, WhatsApp and most of its 2 billion users worldwide or Messenger, who are critical of the commercial exploitation of their users’ personal data. In Russia information channels are more popular than traditional media. Some users have hundreds of thousands of followers, such as Ukrainian DeepState and Russian Rybar, which partly explains Telegram’s success after the war began in 2022. For Stephanie Liu, a personal data expert at the Forrester Institute, Telegram is “the least protected” application, because the user needs to “manually activate” the encryption system. “It is also a platform that is very used for illegal activities,” observed Damien Bankal cybersecurity and blogger specialist in Zataz. Cyberpires can, for example, sell data they have stolen there. As the Telegram discussion teams can participate up to 200,000 people, the platform is also criticized for spreading false news, hate content, conspiracy, terrorism, pro-Nazi, even for pedophilia content. In an interview with the Financial Times in March Durov said he intends to improve the Telegram control mechanism next year, mainly thanks to artificial intelligence. But “if they do not exceed the red lines, I do not think we should control the way people are expressed,” he added. With $15.5 billion worth of property – the 120th worldwide – according to Forbes, 39-year-old Durov became known in 2006. That year he graduated from St. Petersburg University and created with his brother Nikolai the via social networking VKontakte (VK), which quickly became the most popular in Russia, ahead of Facebook. His success caused friction with both shareholders until 2014, when Durov sold the VK, and with authorities. He eventually left Russia when he refused to reveal to security services the personal data of Ukrainian pro-European activists. He has even explained that the idea of creating a platform of encrypted messages was born after the pressures he was under in Russia. After creating Telegram he tried to settle in Berlin, London, Singapore and San Francisco. Finally in 2017 Durov chose Dubai for his favourable business environment and “neutrality”, while the EU and the US were beginning to lobby social media. Durov received citizenship San Kitts and Nevis, an island in the Caribbean, and in 2021 French. In France justice accuses Telegram of not acting to prevent its users from exploiting the platform for illegal actions, such as fraud, drug trafficking, online harassment, organised crime, and even exclamation of terrorism. This is mainly due to a lack of regulatory rules and cooperation with the authorities. Durov was arrested last night at Burze Airport in northern Paris and is expected to appear today before justice. Many countries have tried to block Telegram: Iran and Russia for harboring violent opposition groups, Brazil in 2023 for not revealing to authorities evidence of neo-Nazi groups, Spain in March of violating intellectual property rights. Telegram was fully funded by Durov until 2018. The platform, which measures around 50 full-time workers, opened the advertisements in 2021, stressing however that it will not use its users’ personal data. In 2022 he created a premium subscription system. In the Financial Times Durov assured that his business has “hundred million dollars” revenue, while he did not rule out the possibility of entering the stock market. In March the platform launched a revenue sharing system with content creators.