France Releases Info On Potential Charges Facing Telegram CEO Pavel Durov

French prosecutors released information on Monday about potential criminal charges that Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov is being investigated in connection with after he was arrested late last week when a private jet he was on landed in the country from Azerbaijan.

France’s Ministry of Justice said in a statement that the investigation began in July following a preliminary inquiry initiated by the Paris Public Prosecutor’s Office into “person unnamed.”

Prosecutors listed 12 charges that they are investigating that appear to stem from Durov’s alleged refusal to moderate illicit content on the platform and his company’s lack of cooperation with law enforcement.

The charges included:

• Complicity – web-mastering an online platform in order to enable an illegal transaction in organized group
• Refusal to communicate, at the request of competent authorities, information or documents necessary for carrying out and operating interceptions allowed by law
• Complicity – possessing pornographic images of minors
• Complicity – distributing, offering or making available pornographic images of minors, in organized group
• Complicity – acquiring, transporting, possessing, offering or selling narcotic substances
• Complicity – offering, selling or making available, without legitimate reason, equipment, tools, programs or data designed for or adapted to get access to and to damage the operation of an automated data processing system
• Complicity – organized fraud
• Criminal association with a view to committing a crime or an offense punishable by 5 or more years of imprisonment
• Laundering of the proceeds derived from organized group’s offenses and crimes
• Providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration
• Providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration
• Importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration

In France, different investigative magistrates have broad powers to open investigations and charge defendants when they believe that there is sufficient evidence that a crime has been committed.

The initial 24-hour period in which prosecutors could detain Durov was extended to 96 hours, meaning he could remain in custody until Wednesday.

His arrest sparked intense reaction online from free speech advocates who viewed the arrest as a crackdown on online speech.

In a rare move on Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron addressed the arrest in a post on X, saying that there was a lot of “false information” being spread about the arrest.

“France is deeply committed to freedom of expression and communication, to innovation, and to the spirit of entrepreneurship. It will remain so,” he said. “In a state governed by the rule of law, freedoms are upheld within a legal framework, both on social media and in real life, to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights.”

“It is up to the judiciary, in full independence, to enforce the law,” he continued. “The arrest of the president of Telegram on French soil took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation. It is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to rule on the matter.”