Telegram messaging service founder and CEO Pavel Durov on Thursday attacked France for arresting and indicting him over the publication of illegal content on the app.
In a lengthy message on Telegram, his first reaction since his arrest, Mr Durov found it “surprising” to be held responsible for content posted by others.
“Using pre-smartphone laws to charge a CEO with crimes committed by third parties on the platform he runs is a misguided approach,” the 39-year-old billionaire said.
He also denounced claims that “Telegram is some kind of anarchic paradise,” calling them “absolutely false.”
“We remove millions of harmful messages and channels every day,” Durov insisted.
He refuted France’s accusations that Paris had not received any responses from Telegram to its requests, saying he had personally helped French authorities “establish a hotline with Telegram to address the terrorist threat in France.”
Adopting a more conciliatory tone at the end of his message, Mr Durov acknowledged that the sharp rise in the number of Telegram users — which he now estimates at 950 million worldwide — had created a situation that “made it easier for criminals to abuse our platform”.
– “Becoming safer” –
“That is why I have made it my personal goal to ensure that we significantly improve things in this regard,” he said, adding that the issue was being analyzed “internally” and that further details would be communicated in the future.
“I hope that the events of August will allow Telegram – and the social media industry as a whole – to become safer and stronger,” Durov added.
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He added that if Telegram failed to reach an agreement with local regulators on the “right balance between privacy and security” then “we would be prepared to leave this country.”
After four days in police custody in France, Mr Durov, who holds Russian, French and Emirati passports, was charged with numerous offences linked to his messaging application and banned from leaving the country.
His heavy judicial supervision also provides for a bail of five million euros and a check-in at the police station twice a week.
In Moscow, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned that the prosecution of a “Russian citizen” should not “turn into political persecution.”
Notable supporters of the businessman include Russian-based American whistleblower Edward Snowden and tech mogul Elon Musk, who has posted under the hashtag #FreePavel.
Pavel Durov, whose current fortune is estimated by Forbes magazine at $15.5 billion, was arrested at Le Bourget airport near Paris, where he had arrived by private jet.
According to a source close to the case, Pavel Durov and his brother Nikolai, co-founders of Telegram, have been the subject of search warrants issued by the French justice system since March as part of a preliminary investigation.
Founded in 2013, the Telegram messaging service, which has always claimed to respect European laws, has committed to never revealing information about its users.
A second investigation has also been opened against the billionaire for “serious violence” committed in Paris against one of his sons born in 2017, another source close to the case told AFP.
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