Author: Arain, ChainCatcher
Editor: Marco, ChainCatcher
According to AFP, Telegram founder Pavel Durov was arrested at Le Bourget Airport near Paris between 7:30 and 8 p.m. local time on Saturday, August 24. French investigators issued a search warrant for his encrypted messaging violations. French police also searched Durov's property.
The 39-year-old billionaire, who holds dual French and Russian citizenship, was reportedly searched by OFMIN, the French National Judicial Police, but this is only valid on French territory. Pavel Durov rarely travels in Europe, but this time, he took a private plane from Baku to Paris with a woman and bodyguards, planning to spend at least one night in Paris.
Pavel Durov was arrested by agents from the French National Anti-Fraud Office (ONAF). According to information revealed by employees of the agency, the reason for Pavel Durov's arrest was mainly related to the social media platform Telegram he founded. Regulators accused the platform of being full of drug trafficking, gun black market and child pornography. Previously, Telegram refused to cooperate with the police on this matter.
The TON ecosystem, which is currently in great demand in the crypto market, is built on Telegram's product and user system. As of press time, Coingecko data shows that the price of TON's native token TON has fallen by about 14% in 24 hours, and DefiLlama data shows that Toncoin TVL has fallen by more than 40% in 24 hours.
Elon Musk, founder of Tesla and owner of the X platform, commented on the news that "Telegram CEO Pavel Durov was arrested by French police" on X, saying that this was "advocating for the First Amendment of the US Constitution" and sarcastically said that "it is Europe in 2030 and you were executed for liking a meme."
Elon Musk also quoted Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire 's comments on the matter, pointing out that "something similar just happened on Telegram":
"It was 1994, and Vint Cerf and Rob Kahn had just been arrested. Their invention (TCP/IP) was being used to allow drug dealers to communicate with each other, and they didn't want to install a backdoor."
Musk himself is caught in a conflict with the European Union.
Before Musk interviewed Trump on X, he received a stern warning from EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton about spreading "content that promotes hatred, chaos, incitement to violence or certain false information."
Musk responded to Brayton with a meme from the 2008 movie Tropic Thunder, in which an actor yells, "Take a big step back and fuck your own face."
The reason for the arrest was related to Telegram
Pavel Durov's arrest is related to his creation of the popular social software Telegram.
Telegram was founded in 2013 with a vision of freedom of speech, claiming that "users can exchange encrypted and self-destructing messages, send photos, videos and all other types of files", so it is the first choice for people in the cryptocurrency market to transmit information, but it is also a hotbed for some criminal content.
According to Telegram's monthly active user (MAU) data updated in July, Telegram currently has 950 million monthly active users.
With such a large user base and its emphasis on being a censorship-resistant social network, Telegram has attracted the attention of regulators in many countries, including France, Germany, and the United States. EU countries and the United States have put pressure on it, but Telegram has not responded to regulatory requests.
Pavel Durov is wanted in France's FPR (wanted persons file), a French search warrant issued by OFMIN (command center) of the French National Judicial Police General Directorate based on a preliminary investigation. The judiciary believes that Telegram's lack of content moderation, insufficient cooperation with law enforcement, and the tools provided (such as disposable numbers, cryptocurrency) make him an accomplice in drug trafficking, child pornography crimes and fraud.
ONAF investigators detained Pavel Durov and planned to transfer him to an examining magistrate that evening. On Sunday local time, Pavel Durov could be formally charged with multiple crimes, including but not limited to terrorism, drugs, conspiracy, fraud, money laundering, harboring, and child pornography.
"Over the years, it has become the number one platform for organized crime," an investigator commented in foreign media reports.
According to the Russian Satellite News Agency, Pavel Durov could face up to 20 years in prison. Ekaterina Mizulina, head of the Russian Alliance for a Secure Internet, believes that Pavel Durov's arrest in France was a request from the United States.
She wrote on her personal Telegram channel: "I have long believed that the head of Telegram is in danger outside of Russia and could be arrested at any time. Similar situations have happened before at the request of the United States. I thought that no one touched him because he might be cooperating with Western intelligence agencies, but recent news shows that everything seems different."
In addition, Mizulina believes that the arrest of Durov is aimed at cracking down on the super currency Toncoin circulating on Telegram. She said that in this way, the United States will continue its sanctions policy.
The billionaire who fought censorship
To understand Telegram, you must first understand Pavel Durov.
Pavel Durov was born in 1984. He has a half-brother, Nikolai Durov. The two brothers showed extraordinary talent in mathematics and programming since childhood. Pavel Durov created a derivative product of the Tetris game at the age of 11, and later collaborated with his brother Nikolai Durov to complete a strategy game "Lao Unit" set in China.
When Pavel Durov was in Russia, he realized the importance of information control and launched the Durov.com blog, which attracted 2.7 million visitors and was seen by his classmate Slava Mirilashvili. Slava Mirilashvili found Pavel Durov and founded vkontakte.ru (hereinafter referred to as "VK") with Lev Leviev, and persuaded his wealthy father to fund and capitalize the project.
VK was almost an imitation of Facebook in its early days. Six months after the launch of the beta version, it became the second largest social media in Russia. However, as foreign capital competed for control of VK, and the Russian security agency FSB put pressure on VK to shut down seven opposition groups and pass on user information during the parliamentary election dispute, Pavel Durov showed a non-cooperative attitude - this incident also made Pavel Durov realize the importance of social network security and privacy.
The brothers Pavel Durov and Nikolai Durov eventually left the VK project and founded Telegram in late 2013.
In 2014, Pavel Durov left Russia and tried to settle in Berlin, London, Singapore and San Francisco, and finally set up Telegram headquarters in Dubai.
Telegram has grown rapidly, and in the process, Pavel Durov has had to deal with the FBI and the SEC. And, although Telegram claims that messages on the user side are encrypted, some technicians have criticized its security and privacy reliability.
But this does not prevent users from choosing Telegram, especially when discussing content that may be censored.
In 2018, Telegram had nearly 200 million users, and had not yet found a reliable form of profit. Pavel Durov was once known for not liking to place ads on VK. However, Pavel Durov does not reject encrypted digital currencies. According to foreign media reports, he had 2,000 bitcoins and $300 million when he founded Telegram. It is speculated that he may have used this money to start Telegram.
In January 2018, Telegram announced the launch of the "Telegram Open Network" (TON), which is the predecessor of today's TON, but the two are different. The old TON is a new blockchain that supports an in-application ecosystem. Pavel Durov claims that the network will prove to be "far superior" to existing chains such as Bitcoin or Ethereum, and plans to support payments and purchases, including those from third-party developers.
Telegram raised $1.7 billion through the Toncoin token sale, with participants including Silicon Valley big-name investment companies such as Sequoia Capital, Benchmark, Kleiner Perkins and Lightspeed. In September of that year, Telegram claimed that most of the initial construction of the old TON had reached "90-95%", but the following month, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission characterized the old TON token financing as "the sale of unregulated securities". Under pressure from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Pavel Durov announced that he would abandon the project and return 72% of the funds to the investors of the old TON, while also paying a fine of $18.5 million to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Although the project failed in this form, Pavel Durov handed over control of the old TON to the "community", open sourced its code, and allowed anyone to continue building on the project's architecture.
Later, a group of developers decided to launch the new TON on their own in March 2020. Initially, two developers formed a loose organization called NewTON, which attracted other developers to build the new TON together.
In May 2021, NewTON was officially renamed TON Foundation, and the old TON was also renamed from the original "Telegram Open Network" to "The Open Network" (hereinafter referred to as "New TON". The New TON Foundation was established in 2022.
With the launch of the foundation, New TON has established a close working relationship with Telegram, allowing Telegran to continue building on New TON.
Although the two appear unrelated on the surface, Telegram chose the new TON as the only built-in encrypted network in its application in September 2023, and the goal of the new TON is to allow 500 million Telegram users to enter the blockchain by 2028 - that is, to convert 30% of Telegram's monthly active users into new TON users.
The new TON claims that Telegram is a third-party developer for the new TON, and the only real cooperation between the two is wallet integration.
It is important to point out that Toncoin is the largest asset on Telegram’s balance sheet.
TON plummets, Telegram IPO or stranded
The arrest of Pavel Durov has primarily affected the new TON, which is closely associated with Telegram, and related applications.
DefiLlama data shows that since the news of Pavel Durov's arrest spread, TON TVL has fallen sharply and is currently about US$300 million, a drop of more than 40% in 24 hours, and more than 60% from the historical high TVL of US$777 million. Coingecko data shows that the price of Toncon fell by more than 14% in 24 hours.
TON's official X issued an urgent statement on the "arrest of Telegram CEO": "As a community committed to free speech and decentralization, we firmly support Pavel in this challenging moment. Pavel has always been a loyal advocate of these values, and we believe that his efforts to promote an open and decentralized Internet will continue to inspire millions of people. The TON community remains focused on our mission, and we will continue to work hard to uphold these principles around the world. We encourage everyone to stay calm, unite, and continue to build as we work together to deal with this situation. Thank you for your continued support."
Telegram Wallet posted on the social platform: "We are closely following the recent news about Telegram founder Pavel Durov, but these events will not affect the operation of Wallet in any way."
Telegram official X has not yet made any statement.
It is worth noting that Telegram issued $1 billion in bonds in March 2021. According to foreign media reports, Telegram is considering an IPO plan, and this timing may be inspired by the terms of the bond issuance.
According to a report in Russian newspaper Vedomosti, Pavel Durov has begun talks with investment banks and is looking for a suitable listing venue, including the New York Stock Exchange and certain Asian exchanges.
Pavel Durov previously claimed that Telegram is expected to become profitable this year.
Although it is unclear why Pavel Durov went to Paris despite knowing that France had issued a warrant for his arrest, the arrest of Telegram's founder may have an impact on Telegram's IPO plans as the company considers going public.
