Telegram CEO breaks silence after arrest

But the authorities, Durov said, could have contacted Telegram for assistance if they wanted to.

“Telegram has an official representative in the EU that accepts and responds to EU requests,” he wrote, adding that he also helped French authorities “establish a telephone hotline with Telegram to deal with the threat of terrorism in France.”

Durov was arrested by French police on August 24 after arriving in Paris on his private plane.

The Russian-born entrepreneur received preliminary charges just a few days later, on August 28. Durov was accused of being complicit in the distribution of child sexual abuse and drug trafficking material on Telegram.

Durov, who obtained French citizenship in 2021, has since been released from custody, although he is not allowed to leave France.

“If a country is dissatisfied with an Internet service, the established practice is to start legal action against the service itself,” Durov wrote on Thursday.

“Using laws from the pre-smartphone era to charge a CEO with crimes committed by third parties on the platform he manages is the wrong approach. Building technology is hard enough as it is.”

French President Emmanuel Macron said on August 26 that Durov’s arrest was “in no way a political decision”.

“The arrest of the president of Telegram on French territory took place in the context of an ongoing judicial investigation. This is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to decide,” Macron wrote in an X post.

Telegram, Durov said, recognizes the challenge of balancing privacy with security and “has been working with regulators to find the right balance.”

“Sometimes we cannot agree with a country’s regulatory authority about the right balance between privacy and security. In those cases, we are ready to leave that country,” he wrote, adding that Telegram has been banned in Russia and Iran when they refused to comply. with local authorities.

Telegram was by no means perfect, but it’s certainly not an “anarchic paradise,” Durov said on his channel.

“Telegram’s sudden increase in user numbers to 950 million caused growing pains that made it easier for criminals to abuse our platform. That’s why I’ve made it my personal goal to make sure we significantly improve things in this regard,” he wrote in his post, adding that more details will be shared soon.

“Thank you again for your love and memes,” Durov added.

Telegram representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours.