Pavel Durov breaks his silence and denounces a “surprising” and “erroneous” procedure

“The claims (…) that Telegram is some kind of anarchic paradise are absolutely false,” assures the founder of the messaging service in a publication on his platform.

“The claims (…) that Telegram is some kind of anarchic paradise are absolutely false.” Nearly a week after his indictment and placement under judicial supervision in France, Pavel Durov, the founder of the Telegram messaging service, broke his silence to contest the accusations made against him by the French courts on Thursday, September 5.

The Franco-Russian, indicted as part of a complaint against an unknown person, is notably criticized by the French justice system for not taking action against the dissemination of criminal or offending content on his platform. “I was told that I could be personally responsible for the illegal use of Telegram by others, because the French authorities had not received any responses from Telegram”explains the boss, who explains that he is “surprised” in a message on his own platform.

The Russian citizen, who obtained French nationality in 2021 through a procedure on which Paris remains very discreet, assures in particular that “Telegram has an official representative in the EU who accepts and responds to EU requests”that “The French authorities had many means of [le] “join to ask for help” and that “If a country is not satisfied with an internet service, the established practice is to take legal action against the service itself”.

“Sometimes we fail to agree with a country’s regulator on the right balance between privacy and security”explains the boss of the messaging service, which has made the defense of privacy against authoritarian regimes one of its selling points. “In that case, we are ready to leave the country. We have done so several times.”says Pavel Durov, recalling that Telegram was banned in Russia for not complying with government demands (a ban never fully implemented). “We are willing to exit markets that are not compatible with our principles, because we are not in this for the money.”says the boss.

“All this does not mean that Telegram is perfect (…), but the claims of some media outlets that Telegram is some kind of anarchic paradise are absolutely false”assures Pavel Durov, who claims that “We remove millions of harmful messages and channels every day”. The libertarian founder explains, however, that “Telegram’s sudden increase in user numbers to 950 million caused growing pains that made it easier for criminals to abuse our platform”. He therefore explains that he “set a personal goal to ensure that we significantly improve things in this regard”specifying that the process was already launched and that further information would be shared “very soon”.