Telegram’s founder and CEO, Pavel Durov, has strongly criticised French authorities after his arrest last week, calling their actions “misguided.”
The Russian-born tech billionaire, now a French national, was detained on 25 August at an airport near Paris in connection with accusations of insufficient moderation on the popular messaging app.
Durov, 39, is under formal investigation over suspected complicity in enabling illicit transactions, drug trafficking, fraud, and the spread of child sex abuse content on Telegram.
In France, being formally investigated does not equate to guilt but signals that the judiciary believes there is sufficient cause to launch a full inquiry.
In his first public statement since the arrest, Durov firmly rejected the charges. He denied that Telegram is “some sort of anarchic paradise,” as suggested by media outlets, and described the allegations as “absolutely untrue.”
He further criticised the French legal approach, stating, “Holding me responsible for crimes committed by third parties on the platform is both surprising and misguided.”
Durov argued that French authorities had better options available for addressing any concerns over the app’s content. “If a country is unhappy with an Internet service, the established practice is to start a legal action against the service itself,” he stated.
He emphasised that the use of “laws from the pre-smartphone era” to prosecute him personally for actions taken by users was unprecedented and troubling for innovators.
“No innovator will ever build new tools if they know they can be personally held responsible for potential abuse of those tools,” Durov added.
While conceding that Telegram’s moderation system is not without flaws, Durov insisted that his team works to mitigate harmful content.
“The claims that Telegram is an anarchic paradise are false. We take down millions of harmful posts and channels every day,” he said, adding that French authorities could have easily contacted him or the app’s representative in the European Union to address their concerns.
Critics have long argued that Telegram’s structure, which allows groups with up to 200,000 members, facilitates the spread of misinformation and illicit content. The app has faced scrutiny for hosting extremist groups and far-right channels, with cybersecurity experts maintaining that Telegram’s moderation system is weaker than those of its competitors.
Telegram’s refusal to join international programs aimed at detecting and removing child abuse content has also drawn criticism. Last week, it was reported that Telegram had declined participation in such initiatives, despite other platforms collaborating on the effort.
In his Thursday statement, Durov acknowledged that the platform’s rapid growth—reaching 950 million users—had made it more difficult to manage illegal content. He committed to making “significant improvements” in moderation to address the problem.
Durov’s arrest marks the latest chapter in the controversy surrounding Telegram. The platform, which he founded in 2013, remains particularly popular in Russia, Ukraine, and other former Soviet states. It was banned in Russia in 2018 after Durov refused to hand over user data but was reinstated in 2021.
Despite these challenges, Telegram has grown to become one of the world’s major social media platforms, alongside giants like Facebook, YouTube, and WhatsApp.
Chioma Kalu
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