Russia born Telegram co-founder Pavel Durov has been placed under formal investigation in France as part of a probe into organised crime on the social media and messaging app. The 39-year-old billionaire was charged by the French Judiciary for allegedly allowing criminal activity on the messaging app. However, the Russian-born tech entrepreneur has managed to evade jail time with a whopping €5 million bail.
Pavel, the tech mogul was detained on Saturday at the Le Bourget airport, outside Paris. He was accused of failing to act against illicit content on the platform, including the exchange of child sexual imagery, drug trafficking and fraud.
In a statement, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said that there were grounds to formally investigate Durov on all the charges for which he was initially arrested.
What are the charges?
In the statement released by the Paris prosecutor on Wednesday, the charged placed by the French authorities against Durov are as follows:
- Complicity in the administration of an online platform to enable illicit transactions by an organised gang
- Refusal to communicate with authorities
- Complicity in organised criminal distribution of sexual images of children
While Durov is yet to make a public statement on the matter, his lawyer, David-Olivier Kaminski, stated that Telegram complied in every respect with European digital regulations and was moderated to the same standards as other social networks. He went on to call it “absurd” to suggest that his client could be involved “in criminal acts that don’t concern him either directly or indirectly.”
Durov is also knows as “Russia’s Mark Zuckerberg”, lives in Dubai, where Telegram is based, and holds citizenship of France and the United Arab Emirates.
