The news is sensational: six years ago, Paul Durovnow incarcerated in Paris with 12 charges against him, had lunch with Emmanuel MacronPresident of France. His phone, moreover, had been targeted by French and Emirati spies a year earlier. This interest is not surprising, to tell the truth. Billions of information travel on Telegram that would be coveted by all the governments and all the secret services in the world. Not just Russia, not just France. In fact, for some time now the boundary between technological progress and government surveillance has become increasingly blurred. In this context, the figure of the creator of Telegram he almost seems to emerge as a symbol of resistance against the pressure exerted by authorities around the globe. In 2018 he stood in the way of Putin so as not to provide him with his Vk login details, today he is in prison because he does not cooperate with the French authorities on the alleged illicit activities that are conducted on Telegram. Of which, in essence, he is considered an objective accomplice.
Durov-Macron lunch
As reported exclusively by Wall Street Journalone of the significant stages in the Durov affair was a lunch in 2018 with the French President Emmanuel Macron. During this meeting, Durov received tempting proposals, such as the transfer of Telegram’s headquarters to Paris and the possibility of obtaining the citizenship French. However, the entrepreneur chose to maintain his independence, declining the offer and emphasizing his vision of Telegram as an entity global And apolitical.
It is clear that governments around the world have attempted in various ways to court or control Durov in a growing clash between Telegram’s philosophy of privacy and user autonomy and the authorities’ demands for a access to potentially sensitive information for national security reasons.
Mr. Telegram spied by 007
In 2017, a year before the lunch with Macron, Durov was the subject of the operation “Purple Music“, a joint attempt to France and United Arab Emirates to compromise his iPhone through hacking techniques. This covert operation was born out of growing concerns about the use of Telegram by extremist organizations, such as the Islamic State, to plan attacks. What’s strange? That in the end, after the espionage activity, both France and the Emirates granted Durov citizenship in 2021. The Gulf country also invested $75 million in the platform.
Telegram Independence
Disagreements with Putin
Durov’s life, with his professional and personal choices, reflects a continuous search for a balance between privacy, freedom of expression and responsibility. As the founder of VKontakte to Kremlin criticto become a “multinational sperm donor” and an influential social media personality, his figure represents a living embodiment of the paradoxes of our digital age. Russian by birth, in 2006 he founded VK which quickly became a propaganda tool for Putin’s opponents. In 2011, after several attempts to obtain user data, Moscow asked Durov to sell the social network to a friend of the Tsar. In 2014, the founder of Telegram left Russia, denouncing the strong pressure received from the Kremlin to obtain communications between Ukrainian Euromaidan protesters. “Providing personal data of Ukrainians to Russian authorities would not only be a violation of the law, but also a betrayal of all those millions of Ukrainians who trusted us,” he wrote on VKontakte.
Telegram played a key role in the war in Ukrainehighlighting the dual nature of digital platforms as tools of freedom and potential channels for the spread of harmful content.
Now Durov, held in a prison outside Paris, is charged with 12 counts including facilitating crimes of all kinds: exchange of child pornography, drug trafficking, sale of encrypted software and more. The French prosecutor’s office must question him by tonight and decide whether to charge him or release him.