What we know about the arrest of Pavel Durov, CEO of Telegram

On Saturday, September 3, Pavel Durov, the founder and CEO of Telegram, was arrested by the French police when he arrived at Le Bourget airport in the suburbs of Paris; French authorities said the arrests followed an investigation into whether Telegram, a free and sometimes controversial social networking and messaging platform, was allowing criminal activity on its app due to a lack of oversight.

However, the news of the arrest of Telegram’s founder caused many reactions in cyberspace. In addition, we saw the concern of Telegram users to get out of reach of this messenger or to access their message history. However, not much information is available about this arrest and the details of the charge against the Telegram manager. Let’s review together the most important things we have about this story.

Key facts

• Pavel Durov, 39, was arrested on Saturday night after he landed at Le Bourget airport in Paris from Azerbaijan.

• His arrest was carried out following an investigation into the content monitoring methods in Telegram.
• French authorities believe that Telegram, with more than 950 million users, has not done enough to deal with criminal users and cooperate properly with law enforcement authorities on the use of the messenger for drug trafficking, the distribution of child sexual content and fraud.
• In a message on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday morning, French President Emmanuel Macron said there had been false information about Durov’s arrest, adding that the decision was not political in any way.
• Lawyer Pavel Durov condemned his arrest, telling Russian media that it was like blaming the manufacturer of a car for an accident or using it to transport drugs.
• The Russian Embassy in France said in a statement in X that it had asked the French authorities to explain the reason for Durov’s arrest, but France did not respond to this request.

• Forbes estimates Durov’s net worth to be around $15.5 billion, making him the 500th richest person in the world.
• Telegram is a messaging platform that competes with apps like WhatsApp and Signal. Durov created the app in 2013, years after founding Vkontakte, Russia’s largest social network.
• This app has peer-to-peer encrypted messaging. This means that the messages are transmitted in an encrypted form that is not visible to anyone but the sender and receiver, not even to the messaging service.
• Telegram is known for its social network groups and channels. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Telegram became a major source of communication and is regularly used by the leaders of Russia and Ukraine.
• The messenger has been criticized for its lax approach to censorship, which has led to the spread of extremist and criminal content on the app, although Durov has defended the approach as a safe haven for free speech and privacy (the company says the channels and blocks groups related to terrorist groups).
• Durov, who was born in Russia, fled the country in 2014 after refusing government requests to release data on Ukrainian protest leaders or shut down opposition communities on Vkontakte.
• Durov’s arrest drew criticism from other social media executives, including X-owner Elon Musk, who posted a video of Durov praising X with the hashtag #FreePavel.

• Chris Pawlowski, CEO of Rumble, a video-sharing site popular with conservatives, said France had “crossed a red line” with Durov’s arrest.