LONDON: Telegram boss Pavel Durov has publicly addressed what he calls the “misguided” charges brought against him by French authorities, defending his platform and leadership in his first comments since his arrest.
In a social media post on Thursday, Durov criticized the judicial inquiry that led to preliminary charges and accused him of allowing Telegram to be used for criminal activities.
Those charges came as part of an investigation into the platform’s alleged complicity in the publication of child sexual abuse material and drug trafficking.
Durov, who holds UAE, French and Russian citizenship, said the legal case should target the platform, not its CEO.
“Using laws from the pre-smartphone era to charge a CEO with crimes committed by third parties on the platform he manages is a misguided approach,” he said.
“Building technology is hard enough as it is. No innovator will ever build new tools if they know they can be personally held responsible for potential abuse of those tools.”
While acknowledging that Telegram faced challenges due to its rapid growth, Durov said it was not “some sort of anarchic paradise” and that the company’s efforts to moderate harmful content included removing millions of posts daily and publishing transparency reports.
The platform was working with NGOs to address urgent moderation issues, which had become a “personal goal,” and more updates would be published soon, he said.
Durov was detained by French authorities at Le Bourget airport in Paris last month and questioned for four days.
He was released on €5 million ($5.55 million) bail but is required to report to a police station twice a week. The UAE government has engaged with French authorities on the matter.
Durov said that while in police detention he “was told I may be personally responsible for other people’s illegal use of Telegram, because the French authorities didn’t receive responses from Telegram. This was surprising for several reasons.”
The platform had an official representative in the European Union who replied to EU requests and had a public email address, he said.
“Authorities had numerous ways to reach me for assistance.”
He continued: “As a French citizen, I was a frequent guest at the French consulate in Dubai. A while ago, when asked, I personally helped them establish a hotline with Telegram to deal with the threat of terrorism in France.”
He acknowledged the challenge of creating “a consistent global process” and said that finding the right balance between privacy and security had been difficult due to varying legislation.
“We’ve been committed to engaging with regulators to find the right balance … All of that does not mean Telegram is perfect … But we’ve always been open to dialogue.”
With AP
