Pavel Durov, the CEO and founder of the Telegram messaging app has been arrested in France. According to French media, Pavel who has both Russian and French citizenship, was arrested at Bourget airport outside Paris on Saturday evening. The billionaire had been traveling on his private jet. He was traveling from Azerbaijan and was arrested around 1800 GMT.
It is reported that French authorities have taken the CEO into custody, as part of an investigation on the lack of moderators on Telegram. French authorities claim this lack of content moderation on the encrypted application has permitted illegal activity to flourish. The 39 year old is expected to appear in court Sunday for the alleged offenses.
READ: EU Chat Control: Proposal for Mandatory Scan of User Chat Conversations is Back
It is ironic that France, a western nation which claims to allow freedom of speech, is arresting Durov for the same reasons that made him leave Russia. In 2014, a year after launching Telegram, the CEO left Russia after failing to comply with authorities demand to censor opposition content on his VKontakte social media platform, which he sold.
Russia’s Statement
Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, commented on the arrest of Durov saying, “I just remembered that in 2018 a group of 26 NGOs, including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Freedom House, Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and others, condemned a Russian court’s decision to block Telegram. The West made other similar statements,”
Her statement refers to the Yarovaya Law. The 2018 law requires telecommunications operators to store records of telephone messages and Internet traffic of their clients for six months, as well as keys to decrypt users’ correspondence and provide them to the FSB of Russia upon request. The EU, which France is a member, is also pushing intrusive laws requiring the scan of private (and encrypted) messages for criminal offenses and reporting to authorities by messaging apps.
Today, Telegram has grown to just under one billion users across the world. It among the biggest messaging platforms in the world after WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. The two are owned by American firm Meta. Telegram has had great influence in the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. It has served as the main conduit for unfiltered content, including graphic and misleading information from both sides of the conflict.
Kim Dotcom, who himself has been battling extradition attempts since 2012 after the FBI raided his Auckland mansion posted on the arrest.
Kim is set to be deported from New Zealand to the United States on charges of copyright infringement, money laundering and racketeering.
In the recent past, western nations have been clamping down on tech social media giants with regulations and fines. This arrest is however, the first such action.
