Telegram boss Pavel Durov arrested in France, police custody extended

A day after Telegram boss Pavel Durov was arrested at a Paris airport, French investigators served him a search warrant for various crimes in his encrypted messages and extended his detention on Sunday evening.

The 39-year-old Franco-Russian billionaire was arrested on Saturday evening at the Le Bourget terminal north of Paris, accompanied by his bodyguards and aides, an AFP source said.

A source with knowledge of the investigation added that the Telegram founder arrived from Baku and planned to spend at least one night in Paris, where he also planned to have dinner.

Another source with knowledge of the investigation said his detention was extended on Sunday evening by the Paris investigative judge in charge of the judicial probe, which is looking specifically at the actions of organised crime gangs, for up to 96 hours.

Ultimately, Pavel Durov may be released or presented to this magistrate for possible prosecution (indictment).

A person familiar with the matter explained that the Office for Combating Violence against Minors (Ofmin) has issued a search warrant for Pavel Durov on charges including fraud, drug trafficking, cyber harassment, organized crime, terrorism and fraud.

Since then, the Cyber ​​Unit (J3) of Junalco (the national jurisdiction for combating organized crime) has launched a judicial investigation on a specific date, according to another person familiar with the matter.

The investigation was entrusted to the National Cyber ​​Unit (UNC) of the National Gendarmerie and the National Anti-Fraud Office Onaf, which is attached to the Customs.

According to two sources familiar with the case, he has been detained.

The Justice Department accused Pavel Durov of failing to take action to combat criminal use of their information by subscribers, specifically lacking moderation and cooperation with investigators.

– “Pavel Durov has nothing to hide” –

“It’s enough that Telegram is not punished,” said one investigator, who was surprised that the billionaire decided to come to Paris despite knowing he was wanted in France. “Maybe it was out of a sense of impunity,” said a source with knowledge of the case.

“Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and he travels frequently to Europe,” Telegram assured on its channel on Sunday evening. The company added that it is “absurd to say that the platform or its bosses are responsible for abuses”.

“Telegram complies with European law, including the Digital Services Regulation, and its moderation practices are industry standard,” she said.

The online messaging service launched in 2013 by Pavel Durov and his brother Nikola, whose communications can be encrypted end-to-end and whose headquarters are in Dubai, is positioned to buck the tide of American platforms, which are crucial in their commercialization of personal data.

Telegram specifically promises to never reveal information about its users.

– Elon Musk’s support –

The arrest of Pavel Durov has triggered numerous reactions from the international community. “#FreePavel”, posted Elon Musk, the boss of the X platform, followed by a new message in French: “Freedom. Freedom! Freedom?”.

In Russia, where Telegram is one of the most used social networks and its channels can have hundreds of thousands of subscribers, Foreign Minister Maria Zakharova confirmed that “the Russian Embassy in Paris has immediately gone to work, as is customary” “if a Russian citizen is detained abroad.

She also recalled that many international NGOs had condemned the Russian court’s decision to block Telegram in 2018, but that the decision had never been fully implemented.

“Do you think this time they will appeal for Durov’s release, or will they remain silent?” she asked on her Telegram page.

Pavel Durov said in a rare video interview with US journalist Tucker Carlson in April that he came up with the idea to launch encrypted messaging under pressure from Russian authorities when he founded the social network VK in Russia, where it originated, before selling it in 2014 and leaving Russia.

He said he then tried settling in Berlin, London, Singapore and San Francisco before settling on Dubai, which he praised for its business environment and “neutrality”.

“I think we’re doing very well with Telegram, with 900 million users, and in a year we’ll probably have over a billion monthly active users,” he said.

In this Gulf emirate, Telegram messaging is not subject to state censorship rules at a time when the United States and the European Union are pressuring large platforms to remove illegal content.

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