Durov Breaks Silence After French Arrest: Privacy, Regulation, and Tech Freedom

After Pavel Durov was arrested in France and charged with refusing to cooperate with local law enforcement, the internet was buzzing with speculation. Did Durov crack under the pressure of French authorities and hand over the encryption keys, or would he stand his ground?

Well, after being released on a €5 million bail and ordered to check in with the authorities weekly, Durov finally broke his silence. In short, he believes the French authorities went a bit overboard. Usually, when a country is unhappy with an internet service, the standard play is to sue the platform — not throw the CEO in the slammer for something someone else did. And that’s just the start of what Durov had to say in his statement.

French Authorities Could Have Just Googled

French officials claimed that Durov’s company hadn’t done enough to combat criminal activity on Telegram and that the platform failed to respond to their requests.

In a public message on his Telegram channel, Durov responded, saying it’s not exactly hard to get in touch with him or his company.

“I was told that I could be held personally responsible for illegal activity on Telegram because French authorities didn’t get responses from the platform.” But the irony is that the French law enforcement officials did not bother to Google “Telegram EU law enforcement address.”

“Telegram has an official EU representative who receives and responds to requests,” he explained, adding that the French authorities had multiple ways to reach out for assistance, including via the French consulate in Dubai, which, according to him, he visits regularly.

He also dismissed claims that Telegram is a haven for criminals:

The idea floating around in the media that Telegram is some kind of anarchist paradise is completely unfounded. We remove millions of malicious posts and channels every single day.

However, he did acknowledge the scale of the challenge.

The massive growth in Telegram’s user base to 950 million has brought growing pains, which unfortunately made it easier for criminals to exploit the platform. That’s why I’m setting a goal to significantly improve things in this area.

Trying to catch Durov in a slip, a user on X (formerly Twitter) pointed out that Telegram had recently updated its FAQ, quietly removing the line that said, “All Telegram chats and group chats are private to their participants. We don’t process any requests related to them.”

In a swift response, Telegram’s official account on X shot back: 

“Anyone can check our code to see that nothing has changed. The FAQ update was simply to clarify how to report things, especially under the DSA.”

According to Durov, Telegram doesn’t always see eye-to-eye with a country’s regulators when it comes to compliance, and in such cases, he’s willing to walk away. And that’s not just empty talk. When Russia demanded encryption keys for surveillance purposes, Durov refused, and Telegram was banned in Russia. When Iran insisted on blocking protester channels, authorities got the same answer, and Telegram was banned there, too.

“We’re ready to exit markets that are incompatible with our principles because we’re not doing this for the money,” he explained.

Europe is Scaring Off Innovators

The founder and CEO of Rumble left Europe the day after Telegram’s founder was arrested, stating that France had "threatened Rumble" and "crossed a red line" by arresting Durov.

Rumble, a video-sharing platform based in Florida and Ontario, is known for its more lenient content moderation policies compared to major social media companies, attracting a sizable conservative user base.

With such illogical moves by French law enforcement, it looks like innovators are fleeing France specifically, and Europe in general. If France keeps arresting tech founders, soon the only innovation left in Europe will be finding new ways to lose entrepreneurs.

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