Telegram CEO Pavel Durov arrested in France

Pavel Durov, the founder and CEO of the messaging app Telegram, was arrested at an airport just outside Paris, France , on Saturday.

French police had an arrest warrant for Durov and moved to arrest him after seeing he was on a passenger list for a flight coming from Azerbaijan, according to Reuters.

Durov, a 39-year-old tech billionaire who has been referred to as the “Mark Zuckerberg of Russia” after founding a Russian Facebook alternative called VKontakte, was arrested as part of an investigation into Telegram’s lack of content moderation and the platform’s role in allegedly enabling criminal activity, according to the Washington Post.

Telegram is popular in Russia, Ukraine, and other Eastern European countries and has nearly 1 billion users. However, it is also used by terrorist groups, including Hamas, which posted graphic footage of the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel on the platform. Hamas is banned from posting on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and X.

Telegram said in a post on Sunday that it follows all EU laws regarding content moderation and added that it is “absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform.”

The arrest prompted backlash from Russian officials, who were quick to criticize the West regarding freedom of speech.

“The French continue their fight for ‘freedom of speech’ and ‘European values,’” Russian lawmaker Andrey Klishas posted on Telegram.

The arrest also led to criticism from political commentator Tucker Carlson, who cast it in a similar light.

“Pavel Durov left Russia when the government tried to control his social media company, Telegram. But in the end, it wasn’t Putin who arrested him for allowing the public to exercise free speech. It was a western country, a Biden administration ally and enthusiastic NATO member, that locked him away,” he posted on X.

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Carlson was referring to when Durov fled Russia in 2014 after refusing to hand over data on Ukrainian users on VKontakte requested by the Russian government. Durov now lives in Dubai, where Telegram is based, and has dual French and United Arab Emirates citizenship.

Durov’s detention was extended beyond Sunday night, according to the Guardian.