Telegrams legal battle in France has been a long time coming.
Paris is, essentially, attempting to punish Durov for the nasty things that take place on Telegram.
Bad stuff happens on all social media networks.
Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov delivers his keynote conference during day two of the Mobile World Congress at the Fira Gran Via complex in Barcelona, Spain on February 23, 2016.© Photo by AOP.Press/Corbis via Getty Images
People buy and sell drugs on Facebook.
Terrorists recruit on Instagram.
Thieves plan crimes on TikTok.
Telegram, famously, does not… most of the time.
Telegram has been thumbing its nose at global authorities for years.
Itbrags about itin its on-site FAQ.
Durovs arrest kicked off a wave of calls for his release.
#FreeDurov trended on X. Elon Musk decried the arrest as censorship.
Chris Pavlovski, the CEO of Rumble, left Europe before issuing his own statement.
In 2024 peoples feelings are more complicated.
Most people want the freedom of expression the internet provides but can agree that sharing child porn is bad.
People can still download and use Telegram in France.
Germany threatened to ban the app in 2021 over COVID disinformation butit didnt follow through.
When faced with a real authoritarian regime, Telegram crumbles.
You cant download it in China.
Cuba blocked the app completely in 2021 as a means tostifle dissent.
Bahrain and Azerbaijan have blocked the service for years.
Telegram has also selectively responded to government requests to censor content in the past.
A year after Germany threatened it, Telegram deleted 64 groups Germany saidviolated its hate speech laws.
In 2020 it removed several Belarussian groups that doxxed riot police at thebehest of Apple.
Its also complied with requests fromIndonesiaandIraq.
Telegram has very much been here before.
Durov is not a free-speech martyr.
His legal problems in France arent about political posts.
Theyre about his failure to work with French authorities on the basics of moderating his platform.
If he actually cared about privacy or censorship, Telegrams messages would be end-to-end encrypted by default.They arent.
Telegram abides by EU laws, including the Digital Services Actits moderation is within industry standards and constantly improving.
Almost a billion users globally use Telegram as means of communication and as a source of vital information.
It is technically true that Telegram abides by EU laws, including the Digital Services Act (DSA).
Thats why it was French authorities, not Brussels, that arrested him.
It also only applies to sites with more than 45 million monthly users.
Telegram is demonstrably a vector for child sex abuse imagery and crimes of all sorts.
It showed up in the charging documents of a U.S. Army soldier who was arrested earlier this week.
Heallegedly usedthe service to store and disseminate child sexual abuse material.
Telegram largely ignored them.
So, are tech CEOs responsible for the stuff people post on their platforms?
According to governments across the world, the answer is yes.
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