Pavel Durov, founder and CEO of messaging app Telegram, was arrested on Saturday evening at France’s Bourget airport, according to French television network TF1.
Neither Telegram nor a spokesperson for France’s national anti-fraud office ONAF immediately responded to a request for comment.
According to TF1, Durov faced a warrant in France based on a preliminary police investigation. The French authorities reportedly claim that Telegram’s lack of content moderation and unwillingness to cooperate with law enforcement make Durov an accomplice to the drug trafficking, money laundering, and sharing of child pornography that allegedly occur via the app.
Although born in Russia, Durov left the country in 2014 after resisting government pressure to release data about Ukrainian protest leaders from his previous social network Vkontakte.
Durov said last month that Telegram had 950 million active users, with a goal of reaching 1 billion this year. At the same time, the company claims to have around only 30 engineers — a very small team for an app of Telegram’s scale, likely making Durov even more important to the company’s operation.
