Telegram founder Pavel Durov said on Monday that he returned to Dubai after a stunning arrest at Paris airport last year was tied to a French investigation into criminal activity on his app.
After being intertwined with the Kremlin over free speech years ago, Doloff, who left his hometown of Russia, was arrested last August and banned from leaving France.
He was immediately released on $5.6 million bail and had to report it to the police department twice a week.
In a Telegram post on Monday for his encrypted messaging app, Tech Bylionaire said he was detained in France. The process is ongoing, but being at home feels great. ”
“I would like to thank the investigative judge for making this happen, and my lawyers and team have made a relentless effort to demonstrate that they have not only met years of telegrams but have surpassed legal obligations when it comes to moderation, cooperation and fighting crime,” he added.
Durov is permitted to temporarily leave France after allowing the investigative judge to leave “a few weeks” a few days ago.
Last summer, French authorities said the tech giant from 40 years ago had accused him of conspiring to a wide range of crimes across popular messaging apps, including child sexual abuse and drug trafficking.
Investigators questioned Doloff for four days after he arrested him at Le Bourgette Airport in August. According to the Associated Press.
In September, Doloff defended himself from investigations and insisted that he should not be held responsible for the crime committed on his app.
“Using laws from the pre-smartphone era, it's a false approach to claim a CEO for crimes committed by a third party on the platform he manages,” he wrote in a Telegram post at the time.
“Building technology is hard enough as is. If they know that they can personally be held accountable for the potential abuse of these tools, then there will never be innovators to build new tools,” he continued.
Durov's telegram has become Essential communication tools During the Russian-Ukraine war.
The messaging app sends air raid warnings by government officials, and citizens directly document the fears of war, using it as the final news link between Russia and Ukraine.
Democratic groups around the world also use Telegram to organize demonstrations.
But it also has it in the app Be attacked because it is used by extremist groups Like the Islamic State, white nationalists and Covid-19 and Canon conspiracy theorists.
So does Durov Russian blacklist target Despite pressure from the Kremlin, he refused to shut down an activist group on Vkontakte, another popular app known as the Russian version of Facebook.
The group led by late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny organized a protest in the 2011 parliamentary elections, claiming the victory of Putin's United Russian Party.
The ban, which a Russian spokesman called “mistakes,” was lifted several hours later.
A month before the Blacklist incident, Doloff reportedly was involved in a traffic accident that caused a slight injury to a police officer. The high-tech CEO refused to testify as a witness and instead fled the country, The source who knew him said.
Almost at the same time A private equity company connected to the Kremlin has purchased a 48% stake in VK – Pushing out founding partners who supported Doloff, according to the Moscow Times.
Durov Acquired citizenship of St. Kitz and Nevislives in voluntary asylum. He moved himself and the telegram headquarters to Dubai in 2017 and was granted French citizenship in 2021.
With post wire
