Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s Arrest Linked to Sweeping Legal Investigation

French prosecutors gave preliminary info in a press release on Monday in regards to the investigation into Telegram CEO Pavel Durov, who was arrested suddenly on Saturday at Paris’ Le Bourget airport. Durov has not but been charged with any crime, however officers mentioned that he’s being held as a part of an investigation “towards individual unnamed” and might be held in police custody till Wednesday.

The investigation started on July eight and entails wide-ranging costs associated to alleged cash laundering, violations associated to import and export of encryption instruments, refusal to cooperate with legislation enforcement, and “complicity” in drug trafficking, possession and distribution of kid pornography, and extra.

The investigation was initiated by “Part J3” cybercrime prosecutors and has concerned collaboration with France’s Centre for the Struggle towards Cybercrime (C3N) and Anti-Fraud Nationwide Workplace (ONAF), in response to the press launch. “It’s inside this procedural framework by which Pavel Durov was questioned by the investigators,” Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau wrote within the assertion.

Telegram didn’t reply to a number of requests for remark in regards to the investigation however asserted in a statement posted to the corporate’s information channel on Sunday that Durov has “nothing to cover.”

“Given the existence of a number of preliminary investigations in France regarding Telegram in relation to the safety of minors’ rights and in cooperation with different French investigation models—for example, on cyber harassment—the arrest of Durov, doesn’t appear to me like a extremely distinctive transfer,” says Cannelle Lavite, a French lawyer who focuses on free-speech issues.

Lavite notes that Durov is a French citizen who was arrested in French territory with an arrest warrant issued by French judges. She provides that the record of costs concerned within the investigation is “intensive,” a large web that she says just isn’t fully stunning within the context of “France’s ambiguous legislative arsenal” meant to steadiness content material moderation and free speech.

Durov is a controversial determine for his management of Telegram, largely as a result of he has not usually cooperated with calls to average the platform’s content material. In some methods, this has positioned him as a free-speech defender towards authorities censorship, nevertheless it has additionally made Telegram a haven for hate speech, criminal activity, and abuse. Moreover, the platform is commonly billed as a safe communication device, however a lot of it’s open and accessible by default.

“Telegram just isn’t primarily an encrypted messenger; most individuals use it virtually as a social community, and so they’re not utilizing any of its options which have end-to-end encryption,” says John Scott-Railton, senior researcher at Citizen Lab. “The implication there’s that Telegram has a variety of skills and entry to probably do content material moderation and reply to lawful requests. This places Pavel Durov very a lot within the middle of every kind of potential governmental strain.”

On prime of all of this, many researchers have questioned whether or not Telegram’s end-to-end encryption is sturdy when customers do elect to allow it.

French president Emmanuel Macron mentioned in a social media post on Monday that “France is deeply dedicated to freedom of expression and communication … The arrest of the president of Telegram on French soil befell as a part of an ongoing judicial investigation. It’s under no circumstances a political determination.”

Information of Durov’s arrest is fueling issues, although, that the transfer may threaten Telegram’s stability and undermine the platform. The case appears poised, too, to have implications in long-standing debates world wide about social media moderation, authorities affect, and use of privacy-preserving end-to-end encryption.

Lavite says the case definitely invokes debates about “the steadiness between the precise to encrypted communication and free speech on the one hand, and customers’ safety—content material moderation—alternatively.” However she notes that there’s a lot of details about the investigation that’s unknown and “a variety of blurry zones nonetheless.”

On Monday afternoon, Telegram gave the impression to be receiving a download boost from the state of affairs, transferring from 18th to eighth place in Apple’s US App Retailer apps rating. International iOS downloads have been up by four p.c, and in France the app was primary within the App Retailer social community class and quantity three total.