Telegram CEO Arrested: It is being said about Telegram founder Pavel Durov that when he was arrested in Paris, his girlfriend Julie Vavilova was also with him. There are speculations on social media that Julie Vavilova has a hand in Pavel's arrest because she had inadvertently shared his location. Some are even calling her an agent of Israel's intelligence agency Mossad. 

However, when Pavel Durov arrived in France on his private jet last Saturday, the police first welcomed him but immediately arrested him. As the founder of the direct messaging platform Telegram, he is accused of facilitating widespread crimes committed on it.

The next day, a French judge extended Durov's initial detention period, allowing police to detain him for up to 96 hours. Telegram rejected the charges against Durov. The company said in a statement that it is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner is responsible for the misuse of that platform. The case could have far-reaching international implications, not just for Telegram but also for other global technology giants. 

Who is Pavel Durov?

Born in Russia in 1984, Pavel Durov also holds French citizenship. This may explain how he was able to make the trip so easily, despite his app's role in the Russia-Ukraine war and its widespread use by extremist groups and criminals.

Durov founded the social media site VKontakte in 2006, which is very popular in Russia. However, he was forced to leave the company in 2014 due to a dispute over how the site's new owners were running it. Shortly before this, Durov created Telegram. This platform provides a means of communication and exchange as well as the security of encryption, which makes it harder than ever to track and deal with crime. But that same security also enables people to resist authoritarian governments that want to stifle dissent or protest.

Durov also has ties to well-known tech figures Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg and enjoys widespread support in the vocally liberal tech community. But his platform is not immune to legal challenges—even in his birthplace.

Bizarre target

In some ways, Pavel Durov being targeted by French authorities is bizarre. Meta's WhatsApp messenger app is also encrypted and has three times as many users, while X's incitement to hate speech and other problematic content is publicly known and becoming increasingly widespread.

There is also no indication that Powell himself was engaged in creating any illegal content. Instead, he is accused of indirectly facilitating illegal content by maintaining the app in the first place.

However, Durov's unique background may explain how he came to be at the center of all this. Unlike other major tech players, he lacks US citizenship. He comes from a country with a checkered past for internet activity and a diplomatic reputation tarnished globally by its war against Ukraine. His app is big enough to have a global presence. But it is also not big enough for the unlimited legal resources of major players like Meta. Combined, these factors make him a more accessible target for testing the implementation of an expanded regulatory framework.

The question of moderation

Durov's detention marks another act in an often confusing and contradictory conversation about how much responsibility platforms bear for the content on their sites. These platforms, which include direct messaging platforms such as Telegram and WhatsApp, but also the broader services offered by Meta's Facebook and Musk's X, thus grapple with a variety of legal environments. This means that any sanctions imposed on a platform ultimately affect its services everywhere in the world. On one hand, there is a push to either hold platforms responsible for illegal content or provide details about the users who post it.

In Russia, Telegram has been under pressure to provide the names of protesters who organized through its app to protest the war on Ukraine. In contrast, freedom of expression advocates have fought against users being banned from platforms. Meanwhile, political commentators cry foul about being “censored” for their political views.

These contradictions make regulation difficult to craft, while the global nature of the platform makes enforcement a difficult challenge.

(Edited excerpts from The Conversation)

(Author: Timothy Kosky, University of Sydney)