Pavel Durov, co-founder and CEO of messaging app Telegram, was arrested by French police on Saturday after arriving at an airport outside Paris.
The arrest follows the French government’s investigation into whether Telegram encouraged criminal behavior on its platform. It has drawn some backlash from those who claim the CEO’s arrest violates freedom of expression. Although Durov has not been formally charged with a crime, authorities argue that the platform failed to moderate posts and conversations involving drug trafficking, fraud, child pornography and the promotion of terrorism.
Here’s what you need to know about Telegram, Durov and his recent arrest.
What is Telegram?
Telegram is an encrypted messaging app launched in 2013 by Durov and his brother Nikolai. Since then, it has grown into one of the largest online communities in the world and is considered a central social media, news and messaging platform for people in Russia, Ukraine and India. Telegram now reportedly has 900 million users and Forbes estimates Durov’s net worth at $15 billion.
A big draw for Telegram users is the app’s custom security settings, which allow users to have secret chats – end-to-end encrypted messages that can “self-destruct” or delete themselves based on a timer set by the sender between one second and one week after the recipient opens the message.
End-to-end encryption is a security method that keeps all communications between users confidential and eliminates the possibility of commercial use of users’ personal information, which is a problem in the US. (Notably, only Secret Chats has end-to-end encryption, unlike Signal or WhatsApp, where encrypted messages are the default.)
In a 2020 Telegram post, shortly before the app reached 500 million active users, Durov assured users that the company would not be sold to a larger media conglomerate (as was the case with WhatsApp) and that most features would remain free and ad-free.
Durov told the Financial Times in March that Telegram makes money through in-app purchases, advertising and subscriptions and is close to breaking even.
But freedom from advertising and membership fees comes at a price: Because messages and public posts on Telegram are not moderated as strictly as on other platforms, a lot of content is ultimately allowed – for example from right-wing extremist groups and organized crime – that would be banned elsewhere.
It was once the meeting place for militant groups like the Islamic State to market their beliefs. (Telegram actually shut down channels linked to the Islamic State after the 2015 Paris terror attacks.)
A March Washington Post investigation also found that children and teens on Telegram were victims of massive cyberbullying, with some adults allegedly blackmailing young users into self-harming on camera. (The Post’s investigation also found that this behavior was not limited to Telegram, but also occurred in popular online spaces like Roblox and Discord.)
Who is Pavel Durov?
Durov, 39, spent his childhood in Italy and Russia, where he was born. In an interview with Tucker Carlson earlier this year, Durov described how he and Nikolai were excellent programmers and used to build websites for fun while still in college.
Durov was nicknamed the “Russian Mark Zuckerberg” after he founded a Facebook-like social media company called VKontakte – or VK – in 2006.
In 2013, he and Nikolai launched the instant messaging service Telegram. Telegram describes itself as a combination of social media, SMS and email.
Why was he arrested?
Durov, who holds French and UAE citizenship, was arrested following a preliminary investigation by French police that focused on the lack of content moderation on Telegram, French newspaper Le Monde reported. The investigation accuses Telegram of encouraging criminal activities such as drug trafficking, cyber fraud, child pornography and terrorism through the app’s emphasis on privacy. Police also accused Durov of failing to crack down on criminal activities on its platform and said Telegram had failed to cooperate with law enforcement.
Durov has claimed in the past that Telegram removes all inappropriate images and calls for violence, but the platform remains largely unmoderated, especially compared to others.
In 2014, a year after Telegram was founded, Durov fled Russia after refusing to hand over data of Ukrainian users of his first social media company, VKontakte, to the government. It is not clear whether he renounced his Russian citizenship after his 2014 escape.
Backlash against the arrest
Most of the reactions to Durov’s arrest revolved around freedom of speech. X owner Elon Musk, Chris Pavlovski, the CEO of Rumble, a right-wing version of YouTube, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who just suspended his independent presidential campaign, publicly criticized the decision, citing freedom of speech. Whistleblower Edward Snowden called the arrest “an attack on the basic human rights of freedom of expression and association.” And Tucker Carlson described the situation as “a warning to any platform owner who refuses to censor the truth.”
There aren’t many precedents for such an arrest. Both the European Union and the U.S. government have tried to crack down on social media when it comes to misinformation and criminal activity, and while tech leaders have appeared in court to defend their platforms, no executive has been arrested and held personally responsible for what happens on their app.
“Here in the United States, social media platform owners are largely protected from illegal activity by users on their platforms thanks to the provisions of Section 230 of the Communications Act,” said Walter Scheirer, associate professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Notre Dame and author of A history of fake things on the Internet.
In an interview with Yahoo News, Scheirer noted that while Telegram was still operational as of Monday, “the future of this platform and Durov’s fate may be inextricably linked at this point.”
“It is an open question what impact all this will have on the expression of opinions on the Internet,” he said.
Brian Fishman, former counterterrorism policy manager at Meta, argued that those who defend Telegram on free speech grounds should not downplay the platform’s problems as a problem of inadequate or “superficial” content moderation.
In a post on Threads, Fishman stressed that Telegram’s laissez-faire rules have given it a reputation for decades as a safe haven for terrorists, child molesters and hate groups.
“Should we be looking for dangerous precedents here? Yes,” he said, referring to Durov’s arrest. “But we should also recognize how brazenly Telegram has flouted norms adopted by almost everyone else. It’s not just another platform. It’s been much worse.”
Responding to the backlash and suggestions that Durov’s arrest violated freedom of expression, French President Emmanuel Macron said in an X-post on Monday that France was “deeply committed to freedom of expression and communication” but that “freedoms are safeguarded both on social media and in real life within a legal framework to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights.”
Did Telegram respond to the arrest?
In a statement released on Sunday, Telegram said it “complies with EU laws, including the Digital Services Act” and that “its moderation meets industry standards and is constantly improving.”
“Telegram’s CEO Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and travels frequently throughout Europe,” the statement said. “It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner is responsible for the misuse of that platform.”
