Founder and CEO of Telegram messaging service arrested in France
Founder and CEO of Telegram messaging service arrested in France
[VIDÉO] Selon nos informations, le fondateur et PDG de la messagerie sécurisée Telegram a été interpellé ce samedi soir à l'aéroport du Bourget. Pavel Durov, franco-russe de 39 ans, était accompagné de son garde du corps et d'une femme. - INFO TF1/LCI : le fondateur et PDG de la messagerie Telegram ...
This shit is why end to end encryption is so important.
All platforms, no matter how trustworthy, can be corrupted. No e2e, no privacy.
But this is intentional. TG's ToS forbids alternative clients with their own E2EE.
Also he's the VK founder, which kills any idea of "trustworthy" immediately.
It's part of TG's business model, I think, something in the price list for governments. And the way they treat alternative clients in reality also hints that maybe backdoors are as well. Say, a new message format of the day (they add them really often) arrives in a new official Telegram version, somehow it's nowhere to be seen in the channels and groupchats you're in, but some day a DM arrives with harmless text and some code runs on your client machine.
I use Telegram, but trusting it would be asinine. Even trustworthy services can be abused, and TG doesn't even pretend to be that.
I think he got arrested because happening to be in Baku for a couple weeks and then still be there at the same time with Putin-Aliyev meeting, and their agreements apparently having intersections with Durov's activity, is openly weird.
Reminds me of the Anom phone. E2E encryption, but the whole thing was run by law enforcement.
Useless. Current allegations are related to the absence of moderation. Moderation of public content, in public channels or chats. As you can guess, end to end encryption does not protect public content.
E2E is just one part of the puzzle, you got to have a open source P2P or federated architecture as well, otherwise you have to trust a nebulous company or person intrinsically. People change and companies can be bought, but you will be stuck with their platform in order to contact your acquaintances, and changing that means loosing your contacts.
That is why the DMA is important. But you will be even better off just directly choosing a chat platform, where the users are in control.
What crimes did he personally commit?
From translating TFA:
Justice considers that the absence of moderation, cooperation with law enforcement and the tools offered by Telegram (disposable number, cryptocurrencies, etc.) makes it complicit in drug trafficking, child crime offenses and fraud.
Same reason Russia wanted to arrest him, failure to do the government's bidding.
Next they’ll make encrypting your own files illegal. Absolutely preposterous. Do better police work!
Next up, outlawing pencil erasers and flammable paper
Oh for fucks sake I'm so tired of this bullshit.
Governments nowadays are constantly acting like a tech platform has a responsibility eliminate privacy for users because if they have privacy, then they can't be tracked. It's infuriating.
Told Russia to fuck off, and now France is complicit.
Tells us a lot about how governments view Telegram.
has nothing to do with Russia, according to the linked article
Pourquoi était-il sous la menace d'un mandat de recherche ?
La Justice considère que l’absence de modération, de coopération avec les forces de l’ordre et les outils proposés par Telegram (numéro jetable, cryptomonnaies…) le rend complice de trafic de stupéfiants, d’infractions pédocriminels et d’escroquerie.
Ce mandat de recherche courait si, et seulement si, Pavel Durov se trouvait sur le territoire national.
En effet, Telegram est une ruche pour les contenus criminels. En ce moment, la plateforme fait l'actualité avec la diffusion illégale des matchs de Ligue 1. Mais sur cette messagerie chiffrée, de nombreux comptes sont utilisés par la criminalité organisée. Au-delà du terrorisme, les plus dangereux pédocriminels communiquent sur Telegram pour échanger des contenus. "C'est devenu depuis des années LA plateforme numéro 1 pour le crime organisé", commente un enquêteur.
even if it's not about telegram, this might help to understand ☞ https://www.laquadrature.net/en/2023/12/15/encryption-discussion-during-the-8-december-trial-from-myth-to-reality/
Several of the defendants were questioned about their use of tools and software such as Signal, Tor and Tails, and about the encryption of their computers and hard drives. The questioning followed the same pattern as the prosecution’s investigations, which we revealed a few months ago: a huge amount of confusion as to the technical understanding of these tools combined with a suspicious approach to their actual use. Three defendants were questioned about their motivation for using such software, as if a well-argued justification was needed, even though the tools are perfectly normal, legal and ordinary.
“It is possible and not forbidden to have these tools, but we can ask ourselves why dissimulate information” the president of the court stated. Suspicion of clandestinity coupled with little knowledge of the subject was evident in their questions: “You explain that the use of this ‘kind of network’ [Signal] was to preserve your privacy, but are you afraid of being monitored?”. Or: “Why did you think it was important or a good idea to find out about this ‘kind of environment’ [the Tails operating system]?”.
From the article
The Justice considers that the lack of moderation, cooperation with the forces of law and order and the tools offered by Telegram (disposable number, cryptocurrencies, etc.) makes it complicit in drug trafficking, paedo criminal offences and fraud.
But a lot of people are speculating they just fabricated claims to arrest him because Telegram is russian.
As the CEO he should be responsible for anything he was facilitating as part of his business, and that would include crimes committed using telegram that he was aware of and both did nothing to remove from his service and made it harder for law enforcement to prosecute. You know, like how a warehouse owner who knowingly sells space to pedos and does what he can to keep the police from searching the warehouee is complicit.
There are some circumstances where they are unaware or only take halfhearted measures, but in this case it looks like he is being investigated for actively working to enable criminals, including pedos. As the head executive, he doesn't have to do it personally if he is directing staff to make it happen.
Edit: explaining the logic behind something isn't the same as agreeing with that logic
Sounds like French law enforcement wants a police state that supercedes the civil rights of the public.
You know, the French public have a reputation for getting ugly when the state gets uppity.
That sword over Damocles is swaying in the breeze.
French law enforcement wants a police state
Not at all.
But by tradition in this country, the police has a more "robust" way of doing things. Makes no sense to judge that by other countries' ways.
Looks like France is enforcing chat control 2.0 a bit prematurely.
The EU council is meeting to discuss it again on October 10. A new vote is likely in mid-December. Many parties and countries have turned their coat to support the proposal.
I have not followed this at all. Seems okay at face value. Is that the point, that "protect the kids" a is pretext to creep towards eventual screening of everything?
The meme says the big internet companies are already doing this. Isn't it a legit problem that this sort of harmful child sexual abuse material just moves around the internet like whack-a-mole?
The Democratic nations of the world have all gone to Telegram and begged for help to address human trafficking, to address terrorism, to literally prevent wars, and they are told to fuck off. Seems criminal to me.
What should be criminal is forcing private citizens to act as police officers and throwing them in jail if they refuse.
I think you got the point. Criminals use the same services as the rest of us. CSAM is being used as pretext to outlaw or bypass end-to-end encryption.
It's a noble cause, but it puts all of us in a vulnerable position. As post-communist countries know from past experience, once these measures are in place the next government will use it for surveillance of all kind when it's their turn.
Yes, I know. If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear. I'm not doing anything illegal at the toilet, but I still prefer to keep the door closed - even if I'm home alone.
Chat control 1.0 has been voluntarily inplemented by big platforms, but it has not been fruitful. Lots of false positives and not enough resources to look at the true positives. The delegates preparing this have demonstrated poor technical understanding.
Whistleblowers won't have confidence in anonymity. A journalist asked the author (Ylva Johansson) of the proposal if he, as a journalist, would still be able to receive tips from whistleblowers with secrecy. She stumbled ln her answer and said that CSAM should be illegal.
Police and officials are of course exempt from chat control 2.0. Secrecy for me, but not for thee. . .
English language story from Reuters (no paywall) for anyone that doesn't speak French...
"criticism from X owner Elon Musk who said that free speech in Europe was under attack."
Comes from the guy who bans certain words and anything negative about him on X. Oh the irony.
Firefox french translation, not perfect but usable.
Why was he under threat of a research mandate?
The Justice considers that the lack of moderation, cooperation with the forces of law and order and the tools offered by Telegram (disposable number, cryptocurrencies, etc.) makes it complicit in drug trafficking, paedo criminal offences and fraud.
This research mandate ran if, and only if, Pavel Durov were in the national territory. "He made a pellet tonight. We don't know why... Was this theft just one step? In any case, it is ready-made", slips a source close to the investigation to TF1/LCI. Ever since he knew himself persona non grata in France, Pavel Durov used to travel to the Emirates, to the countries of the former USSR, to South America ... He had travelled very little in Europe and avoided the countries where Telegram is under surveillance.
What now?
Investigators from the National Anti-Fraud Office attached to the Customs Directorate (ONAF) notified him and held him in police custody. He should be presented to an investigating judge this Saturday evening before a possible indictment on Sunday for a multitude of offences: terrorism, narcotics, complicity, fraud, money laundering, concealment, child-criminal content...
Unlike other chat services Telegram has a “social” aspect and search capabilities for locating public discussion channels.
Furthermore E2EE is optional and most people don’t turn it on and is certainly not on in public channels.
While techies are freaking out about an attack on encryption the articles I’ve read so far don’t mention anything about encryption or otherwise it seems that French police is concerned about moderation or attempts at moderation of those public channels, that Telegram specifically refuses to moderate.
Perhaps this will be an attack on encryption by stealth but at this point that’s not what it looks like.
As a personal anecdote when I installed Telegram a few years ago and searched for my city’s name the top 20 results where channels offering to sell you heroin - which I thought was so blatant as to be certain it was police sting operations - but who knows.
Unlike other chat services Telegram has a “social” aspect and search capabilities for locating public discussion channels.
That's the good part. I hope something else takes the niche.
But it being very insecure and positioned as secure is bad.
And some people think Brazil is being extreme on putting fines for X (Twitter) to pay for not blocking some accounts.
This guy is accused of being accomplice to crime just for creating and maintaining the platform where criminals do their dealings.
The road is downhill, my friends.
If somebody runs a market hall and allows stalls to be set up where narcotics and CSAM is being sold, and profits from it, and ignores police requests to stop it, I would like something to happen against that person. That person is complicit.
What I can’t understand is why telegram doesn’t just set up the some moderation systems. Most of their growth surely doesn’t come from drug dealers and pederasts? It feels like it would be a tiny element of it and not worth the hassle.
I suspect Durov doesn’t like dealing with big teams and can’t be bothered.
I’m a heavy user of Telegram (average about 1h of screen time every day, and pay for Telegram Premium) entirely because all my friends are on it and that’s because it is the best messaging client BY FAR. I’d love not to share this platform with criminals.
Since when did fighting crime become a “totalitarian state” thing to do?
I hope they arrest the CEO of ExxonMobil next. Arrest all the CEOs, France.
to take into consideration:
The Russia-born entrepreneur lives in Dubai, where Telegram is based, and holds dual citizenship of France and the United Arab Emirates.
Reeks of the chat history access attempts and the like, or is it just my paranoia?
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean you're wrong.
Your making me feel worse
My plug is on Telegram. Afaik (at least in France) it's mostly used to sell drugs. I'm not surprised the police would like their cut
Telegram has always had the sketchiest people on it. I refuse to use it because it feels like I'm talking with human traffickers. Doesn't surprise me he was arrested.
I refuse to use it because it feels like I’m talking with human traffickers
I, too, prefer spending my time on subs related to things I neither own, used nor enjoy!
So never used the app, but flat out make that assumption. Check. lol
I'm a sex worker so I get a LOT of requests to use Telegram. Human trafficking is something I am directly exposed to and I am in danger of. The men who request to use Telegram make me feel in danger. So it doesn't surprise me the owner of that app was arrested. My assumption comes from my experience.
This sub isn't a telegram sub, it's a technology one. I use technology.