Pavel Durov, the mastermind behind the social network Telegram arrested Saturday in France, will remain in police custody until Wednesday. But the offenses he is accused of, including his responsibility in drug trafficking and the sharing of child pornography that are organized on his platform, are causing perplexity.
Who is Pavel Durov?
Nearly 40 years old, Pavel Durov was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, before moving to Italy at the age of 4. The Durov family returned to live in Russia after the fall of the USSR, he said in a rare interview last year.
Pavel Durov became known for the success of his first social network, VKontakte (VK), a sort of “Russian Facebook” launched in 2006, which earned him the nickname “Russian Mark Zuckerberg”. But starting in 2011, pressure from the Kremlin to close the user accounts of members of the opposition, or to hand over the personal data of Ukrainian pro-democracy activists in 2014, finally pushed him to abandon VK and Russia.
PHOTO YULIA MOROZOVA, REUTERS
People placed paper planes, a reference to the Telegram logo, in front of the French embassy in Moscow during a rally for freedom of expression.
Since then, he has settled in Dubai, obtained citizenship of the Caribbean archipelago of Saint Kitts and Nevis, then obtained French nationality in August 2021. It was therefore as a French citizen that he disembarked from the plane on Saturday evening, at Le Bourget airport, north of Paris, before being arrested.
What is the Telegram social network?
Launched in 2013, the Telegram messaging service is immensely popular in Russia, Ukraine, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
According to its managers, more than 950 million users log on to Telegram every month. Among them, several political opponents, as well as fighters from the Islamic State.
Its users appreciate its efficient and very fast interface. They can subscribe to chat channels or exchange private messages with groups or individuals. Unlike WhatsApp and Messenger, the two applications that Telegram resembles, the latter does not belong to Meta and is therefore more easily accessible in countries where Mark Zuckerberg’s empire is banned.
But above all, Telegram prides itself on being a haven for free speech and protecting users’ privacy. “It’s very unmoderated,” says Fanny Tan, a researcher at the Raoul-Dandurand chair. “And so, there’s a lot of misinformation there.”
Why is content posted on Telegram not moderated?
“From a technical standpoint, it’s hard to moderate Telegram,” says Tim Weninger, a professor in the department of computer science and engineering at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana and an expert on disinformation, over the phone. The chat rooms (which can be as large as 200,000 people!) aren’t designed for outsiders to intervene, not even the network’s managers. “It’s kind of like WhatsApp,” says Weninger. “If I send you a message, Mark Zuckerberg can’t moderate it.”
Telegram doesn’t say: we won’t moderate, we won’t interfere in discussions. It says it can’t do it. The technology doesn’t allow it to moderate content.
Tim Weninger, professor in the department of computer science and engineering at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana
This is what the company is arguing: “It is absurd to say that a platform or its boss are responsible for the abuses” noted on the platform, it declared.
PHOTO STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
The National Anti-Fraud Office where Pavel Durov is currently being held, in Ivry-sur-Seine, south of Paris
For these reasons, Tim Weninger did not expect that Durov could be arrested for not moderating the content exchanged on his platform. “So there must be something else,” the professor suggests. Perhaps the French authorities have evidence of an event where Telegram managers could have intervened? “Maybe they had the opportunity to remove child pornography, or something, and they didn’t?”
What impact could this arrest have on social media users?
“I don’t think it’s going to scare users, but it could scare the operators of social networks,” Weninger said. “If Durov could be arrested, I don’t see why Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg or someone else couldn’t be arrested because of dangerous content on the platforms.”
“Social networks like Facebook and X collaborate much more with the authorities than Telegram does, notes Fanny Tan. This is why Telegram is more in the crosshairs of the authorities than the other giants.”
What will happen in the coming days?
The Franco-Russian billionaire was placed in police custody until August 28 as part of a judicial investigation opened on July 8. He is accused of twelve offenses, including refusing to communicate the information necessary for interceptions authorized by law, complicity in offenses and crimes organized on the platform (drug trafficking, child pornography, fraud and money laundering in an organized gang) and the provision of cryptology services aimed at ensuring confidentiality functions without a proper declaration.
With Agence France-Presse, The Washington Post And The Guardian
European regulation on illegal content
Since the entry into force of the Digital Services Regulation In Europe, hosting service providers, including online platforms, must offer Internet users a tool that allows them to easily report illegal content. “The notified content can then be deleted or blocked by the platform concerned. However, platforms subject to the [Règlement] “There is no general obligation to monitor and it is therefore always up to users of the service to report content they consider illicit,” Sonia Cissé, a lawyer specializing in technology, media and telecommunications at Linklaters, told AFP. Telegram complies with European laws, the company responded on Sunday evening. “Crime and hate speech have proliferated on Telegram, but Durov has been incredibly uncooperative. […] “If he had been more cooperative, it’s unlikely he would have found himself in this situation,” Marc O. Jones, an associate professor at Northwestern University in Qatar, told AFP.
According to Agence France-Presse