What to know about Telegram, the messaging app whose CEO was arrested over the weekend

New York (CNN) — The arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in France over the weekend has thrust the popular messaging service and its enigmatic founder into the spotlight.

Russian-born Durov was detained Saturday at Paris’s Bourget Airport on a warrant related to Telegram’s lack of moderation.

Those charges include allegations that his platform was complicit in aiding fraudsters, money launders, drug traffickers and people spreading child sexual exploitation content, French prosecutor Laure Beccuau said in a statement Monday. Beccuau added that Durov is accused of refusing to communicate “information or documents” related to the investigation.

The app has also recently come under scrutiny for its use by terrorist groups and far-right extremists.

Durov’s arrest has sparked a debate about freedom of speech and who has responsibility for illicit content on the internet. Russian lawmaker Maria Butina — who was convicted in the US on spying charges and deported to Russia in 2019 — on Sunday called the CEO a “political prisoner,” according to Reuters.

But French President Emmanuel Macron said in a statement posted to X on Monday that Durov’s arrest was “in no way a political decision.”

“I’m reading false information about France following the arrest of Pavel Durov,” Macron said, adding that the arrest “took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation.”

The Paris prosecutor’s office said Monday that Durov’s arrest is part of a broad investigation into a range of criminal activity dating back to July 8 on Telegram, with a total of 12 separate charges.

Telegram has said that it abides by EU law and that Durov has “nothing to hide.”

Here’s what you need to know about Telegram and why it’s come under fire.

What is Telegram?

Telegram is an encrypted messaging service that was launched in 2013 by Durov and his brother, Nikolai. The app now has more than 950 million users, according to a post from Durov last month, making it one of the most-used messaging platforms in the world.

The platform has evolved into a crucial service in many countries, used for everything from day-to-day chatting and sending photos and documents to disseminating government messages.

Because conversations on the app are encrypted, law enforcement – and Telegram itself – have little oversight on what users post.

That privacy has made Telegram an important communication tool in countries where freedom of speech is curtailed, such as Russia, Iran and India. The app is also popular in Ukraine, where it has become a vital tool for sharing news about the war and warnings about air raids.

But those same protections have also made the service popular among drug traffickers, money launderers and extremists, including White supremacists and terror groups such as ISIS.

Telegram allows as many as 200,000 users to join individual chat groups, where false claims can spread rapidly. Other encrypted services, such as Meta’s WhatsApp, have much smaller limits on group sizes.

In March, Durov told the Financial Times that the app was “nearing profitability” after introducing advertising and subscription offerings two years ago, adding that the company was considering an initial public offering.

A platform that’s courted controversy

Beyond its use by criminals and extremists, Telegram has faced scrutiny for its role in major conflicts and political events, as well as its refusal to abandon its commitment to encryption.

Moscow in 2018 attempted to ban Telegram for refusing to supply Russian security services with decryption keys that would allow state authorities to read private messages. Durov vowed to defy the ban, which was ultimately lifted in 2020.

Telegram became popular among Trump supporters and followers of the Q-Anon conspiracy theory in 2021 after mainstream social media platforms such as Facebook began cracking down on false claims that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen. This prompted concern from law enforcement officials who worried that the disinformation could lead to more real-world violence.

Last fall, Telegram restricted access to several channels closely associated with or operated by Hamas amid the militant group’s war with Israel.

And earlier this month, the messaging app began actively removing calls to violence from the platform following reports that the app was being used to organize far-right, anti-immigrant riots in the United Kingdom.

“Telegram’s moderators are actively monitoring the situation and are removing channels and posts containing calls to violence,” Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn said in a statement at the time. “Calls to violence are explicitly forbidden by Telegram’s terms of service.”

Telegram moderators proactively monitor public parts of the platform, as well as rely on AI tools and user reports to remove content that breaks its rules, Vaughn said.

In its statement on Sunday, Telegram said that “it is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform.”

Who is Pavel Durov?

Durov, Telegram’s billionaire founder and chief executive, was born in the Soviet Union in 1984. He has said he showed an aptitude for math and coding from an early age.

In 2006, Durov launched Vkontakte (VK), a social media site, when he was a 21-year-old fresh out of university. As the app grew, he became colloquially known as the “Mark Zuckerberg of Russia.”

But when protesters began using VK to organize demonstrations in Kyiv against Ukraine’s pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovich, in 2013, Durov said the Kremlin asked the site to hand over private data of Ukrainian users.

Durov refused, resigned as VK’s CEO, sold his shares in the company and, in 2014, left Russia. “I don’t want to take orders from anyone,” Durov has said of his decision to give up the company and leave his home country.

Durov also launched Telegram in 2013. He now lives in Dubai, where Telegram is headquartered, and is also a citizen of France.

In addition to running Telegram, Durov has become something of an online influencer, sharing images on Instagram of his world travels (and, often, shirtless photos). He also claims to have fathered more than 100 children thanks to sperm donations he had made over the past 15 years.

–Joshua Berlinger, Camille Knight and Anna Chernova contributed to this report.

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