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© Thomson Reuters 2024.French authorities charge Telegram's Durov in probe into organized crime on app
By Gabriel Stargardter and Tassilo Hummel PARIS©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
59 Comments
sakurasuki
It just show that Govt just won't be happy when they are not being granted censorship and also eavesdropping access.
Underworld
sakurasuki
This has nothing to do with censorship. Nor does it have anything to do with eavesdropping - Telegram chats aren't end-to-end encrypted.
Underworld
Child safety advocates have been begging authorities to do something about Telegram for years now. The company’s refusal to answer almost any law enforcement request, no matter how dire, has enabled some truly vile behavior.
“Telegram is another level,” Brian Fishman, Meta’s former anti-terrorism chief, wrote in a post on Threads. “It has been the key hub for ISIS for a decade. It tolerates CSAM. Its ignored reasonable [law enforcement] engagement for YEARS. It’s not ‘light’ content moderation; it’s a different approach entirely."
Alfie Noakes
A hearty laugh is a fine way to start the day. Macron called an election in which the left and centre-left won the most seats; he refused to allow them to form a government and name a Prime Minister, then joined forces with the Fascists to keep the Left out. Every man and his dog knows the recent censorship of US-owned social media is politically motivated.
Underworld
Alfie Noakes
Yet there is no evidence of this.
itsonlyrocknroll
To suggest this charade is not politically motivated is absurd farcical.
Every facet of political intrigue, of political/economic digital cryptographic vested interests are on full display and in play.
From the deadweight EU Digital Services Act, to the EU commissions failed digital market Rubicon.
On every conceivable level, regulation, the fumbling antitrust statutes, the lack of creditable innovation.
A lesson on over regulation, a pickpocket taxation mentality, a shameful failure to invest, take risks.
Where is a UK/EU/European tenable European competitor to Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Apple, TikTok, Uber etc?
The US economy is built on a solid foundation of entrepreneurship, technical innovation, an "American way" of risk management.
Macron, a failed illiberal authoritarian phoney, soon to be joined by his conjoined political twin Keir Starmer.
diobrando
The weird point is how Durov got French nationality in 2021?! Holding it means UAE and Russian authorities cant provide any kind of help that in all the case doesnt need by being billionair (he paid a caution of 5 millions euros!).
CS
Meanwhile, Zuckerburg sent an apology letter to Congress wanting forgiveness for all the misleading censorship Meta did and said his company would stay out of politics this election season.
He knows full well that if they can arrest Mr. "Telegram" they can surely arrest Mr. "Meta"
Underworld
diobrando
Why would Russian authorities help Durov? They pushed him out of Russia in the first place.
Underworld
itsonlyrocknroll
And yet you have no proof that it is.
Pukey2
itsonlyrocknroll
Orwellian, dystopian, modern repressive Macron government need to censer, control, manage manipulate, propagate, their bespoke toxic brand of misinformation,
Democracy?
No, a surveillance society, facial recognition, cashless monitored transactions.
My business has a solid team of encryption product development professionals. Researchers.
Telegram is and will continue to be open, secure, for journalists, free from government interference.
So Marcon attempts jail the messenger, as Macron presides over his appalling failures in office.
sakurasuki
@Underworld
It does use but they let users decide it.
https://tsf.telegram.org/manuals/e2ee-simple
https://www.alphr.com/does-telegram-use-end-to-end-encryption/
Underworld
itsonlyrocknroll
So your business would understand that almost all traffic over Telegram is not end-to-end encrypted (like WhatsApp and Signal are).
itsonlyrocknroll
You need proof, Underworld?
Do you honestly believe the long history of political "skulduggery" is confided to the governments of China, Russia?
Underworld
sakurasuki
@Underworld
Telegram chats aren't end-to-end encrypted.
Sure, its “secret chat” feature is end-to-end encrypted, but it is not enabled on chats by default. The vast majority of chats on Telegram are not secret chats.
Secret chats are difficult to use - it works at the device (not chat) level, and both devices have to be online for it to work. Additionally, it only works for a one-to-one chat. It doesn't work for group chats.
Underworld
itsonlyrocknroll
I'm sure there is, but I don't waste my time speculating. If I don't have proof of something, I won't comment on it.
itsonlyrocknroll
Underworld, telegram is "free" however fully source code adaptable....
Creating your Telegram Application.....scroll down
https://github.com/DrKLO/Telegram
checkout Compilation Guide
Download the source code.
Not just a "messenger"
itsonlyrocknroll
Remember Underworld all social media active within the "EU" must comply with complexities of The Digital Services Act
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/digital-services-act-package
Underworld
itsonlyrocknroll
Sure, the client source code is available. Why is this relevant? The servers are controlled by Durov.
Well, no. It is just a messenger.
JJE
They need to cut the clown act.
The French authorities (acting under Washington's orders no less) want the encryption key. Pavel does not have it.
His brother Nikolai Durov is the mathematical genius behind the whole thing and only he has it.
itsonlyrocknroll
Underworld
We are all bottom line, posting an opinion. it not a papal bull, it a invitation to debate.
I would never ask you for proof. evidence.
Eastmann
remember when they have arrested Julian Assange because of rape of some lady?
Durov walking at same path now.abusing of kid or something like that.nothing political.
yeah we know how to read between lines.
reality is that Telegram could not be controlled as say Meta sites/apps...its called a censorship dear 2020hindsights.pure censorship.
JJE
Macron, the electoral autocrat, has turned France, the homeland of Voltaire and the Enlightenment, into a jurisdiction that pre-emptively censors social media and the Internet. This is censorship for a political agenda 101 under the pretext of some ridiculous charges.
And these are the same people who point their hypocritical finger at China and others.
Underworld
Eastmann
Not at all. It has nothing to do with Durov personally. It's his platform. It's used by perverts to distribute, buy, and sell CSAM. Telegram's policies do nothing discourage it, and neither does the moderation.
M3M3M3
It's like arresting the owner of a restaurant where the mafia likes to eat and plan crimes just because he refuses to install a bug under the table.
Part of the problem is that modern law enforcement has become so reliant on having all the electronic evidence served up to them on a silver platter. If they can't get access to phones and chats, they either lack the will or the resources to investigate crime the old-fashioned way.
Underworld
JJE
And yet this has nothing to do with censorship. France isn't trying to censor anything.
JJE
The abuse of a kid thing - not mentioned in this article - relates to his 6 year old son and French prosecutors using a complaint filed by his wife, Irina Bolgar, who lives in Switzerland (now believed to have separated) with Swiss authorities, where she resides with the son (who was born in Russia), that asserts that he physically abused his son on a number of occasions.
Important to note these are just allegations on paper from another jurisdiction that have not been tested in court, there or anywhere. Also appear to more of a child custody-money dispute by said person as it was filed when he cut back large monthly monetary payments.
Why this is being used and weaponized by French authorities is quite bizarre to say the least.
M3M3M3
They clearly are. Many of the crimes that Durov will be accused of being complicit in are likely to be violations of French hate speech laws, holocaust denial, and so on. Of course these are actual crimes in France even if they aren't in Japan and elsewhere.
In my view, outright censorship in the form of Chinese-style national firewalls and strict controls over ISPs would be more honest and preferable to what France is attempting to achieve here. Simply claiming that something is illegal in your country is an unworkable standard. There are millions of posts on Facebook and X that violate domestic Chinese law but Zuckerberg and Musk are never arrested when they visit China. If you don't want something harmful being accessible in your country, it falls on you to filter it out and censor it, not on a foreign company to moderate according to your national standards.
JJE
This arrest is being used as a means to take over control of the independent Telegram platform and block Russian and other viewpoints from Western audiences.
That is called censorship.
Underworld
M3M3M3
And yet this has nothing to do with censorship. France isn't trying to censor anything.
No, it isn't.
They aren't trying to do that. They aren't trying to bring Telegram down. They just want it to stop being the go to place for trading CSAM etc.
And they aren't arrested when they go to France. That's because nobody uses Facebook or X to trade CSAM.
Underworld
JJE
No, it isn't.
Underworld
JJE
It's not.
Some dude
A Russian involved in dirty, illegal things?
Say it ain't so. I'm shocked, shocked I tellz ya.
JJE
Any tech people will be giving France a big miss. Elon won't go near the place with a barge pole.
Fact he was released on bail could well indicate Macron is backing down - but he has his wounded French pride and has to save face and pretend he has big boy pants.
JJE
Had Durov been arrested in Russia, the West would have denounced Moscow as repressive, but it’s a completely different narrative when France does it.
France is extorting Pavel Durov for Telegram’s encryption codes so they can censor the messaging platform.
Anyone and anything that goes against the mainstream Western-unipolar-globalist-war narrative needs to be censored.
If he resists the blackmail and doesn't give up the codes, Telegram has a huge future - and keep in mind DLs of it have surged off the charts since his arrest.
The huge popularity of Telegram is precisely because of its relative lack of censorship.
This is the above west pushing that aside and imposing on people what they should and shouldn't think.
It's about the politicized blocking of viewpoints which contradict the worldview narrative with censorship.
Some dude
Any tech people will be giving France a big miss. Elon won't go near the place with a barge pole.
I'm sure the French will be devastated by that and will respond with the classic Gallic shrug.
Some dude
Anyone and anything that goes against the mainstream Western-unipolar-globalist-war narrative needs to be censored.
I used to be quite impressed with phrases like that when I was 14.
burgers and beers
Anyone and anything that goes against the mainstream Western-unipolar-globalist-war narrative needs to be censored......I used to be quite impressed with phrases like that when I was 14.
Figuring out it is more profitable to tow the line at 14 is impressive.
burgers and beers
Now, who would have thought?
French authorities have launched an investigation into claims that Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov committed “serious acts of violence” against his own son, AFP reported on Wednesday. The investigation is separate from an ongoing probe into his alleged complicity in a wide range of crimes.
Underworld
JJE
Why do you think Durov left Russia? Might have something to do with a SWAT team appearing at his door in St. Petersburg.
JJE
He was never arrested in Russia.
Not once.
JJE
And how did he leave Russia? (with permission of the government... duh).
All in stark contrast to how he cannot leave France right now.
John
The analogy to a restaurant being arrested f it refused to plant a bug on the mafia for eating there is inaccurate.
This is analogous to a restaurant boss being arrested because he knowingly condoned the mafia using his place to deal drugs or olan hits.
Some dude
Interesting. "The BBC has learned that Telegram - whose boss has been arrested in France - refuses to join international programmes aimed at detecting and removing child abuse material online".
Then again, dealing with a moral cesspit of a country like Russia, is anyone surprised?
Strangerland
It's an interesting one. This guy may or may not be an enemy of Putin.
It sounds like this would require building a backdoor into end-to-end encryption, which would break the whole paradigm. No other e2e messaging service would be able to do this without a backdoor either. Backdoors are security holes.
Underworld
JJE
He still had a SWAT team appearing at his door in St. Petersburg.
Putin’s allies took control of VKontakte, Durov's equivalent of Facebook. Eventually, he sold his remaining stake for millions and fled Russia after resisting government pressure to release the data of Ukrainian protest leaders.
Strangerland
The Russians are panicking, because if there is a backdoor, they are screwed since they use Telegram for their military communications.
Underworld
Strangerland
I agree that no tech company should be forced to create a back door.
But some kind of moderation and terms and conditions that don't allow criminal content to run rife on Telegram should be enforced.
Some dude
The Russians are panicking, because if there is a backdoor, they are screwed since they use Telegram for their military communications.
I don't think this is a big deal. Everyone already knows more or less what their "military communications" say:
"Send large number of troops to fail to capture Kyiv. Observe large number of troops get captured or killed. Observe large number of tanks get smashed up. Send more troops. Anyone will do. Toothless 50 year olds with blood-alcohol reading of 50 per cent. Anyone. Tell Putin that everything is great. Rinse and repeat".
JJE
"Swat team at the door" was a little bit of melodrama and hyperbole for the benefit of the NYT and their crowd of readers who suck up that thing, when in actual fact it was just normal police turning up.
Fact remains he was never arrested in Russia. Not even detained.
And he left the country at his own freewill and leisure with the government approval, as opposed to "fleeing", assumably for his life, which again sounds more dramatic but is just false. For such an enemy of the Russian state, he lived quite peacefully and unmolested abroad, until he goes to France... oops.
This "pressure" you mention is true but mischaracterized - and it never involved arrest.
He didn't allow the authorities in unlike Meta and most big tech stateside which has opened the door wide.
And that is what ultimately this is all about - censoring an uncontrolled platform of other viewpoints under the pretext of ridiculous and unspecified charges, exactly as they did to Assange.
TaiwanIsNotChina
Assange was only good at encouraging others to commit crimes. Never built anything himself.
Some dude
*Fact remains he was never arrested in Russia. Not even detained.*
Probably because it can't be hard to find someone to slip a few rubles to in a country literally built on corruption.
M3M3M3
@Underworld
Unless you explain what this means and how it will be enforced, it's vacuous.
China agrees that CSAM and drug sales are illegal and must be moderated, but so does spreading "social disharmony" and "rumors"
Japan agrees, but they also think all uncensored pornography is illegal.
Middle-eastern countries agree, but they also say it's illegal to insult Islam.
France agrees, but they also say it's illegal to question the Holocaust.
What is your answer to the problem of divergent laws in different states? Should we only moderate criminal activity that all countries agree is illegal, or should every social media CEO be subject to potential arrest everywhere for anything that might be illegal somewhere? Telegram is a Dubai based corporate entity.
@John
Knowledge alone does not make you an accessory to a crime. Nor is serving members of the public food and providing a table likely enough to make you part of the criminal conspiracy.
bass4funk
That is the key element in all of these, everyone particularly the left is quick to jump on these allegations as if they are fact-based without knowing all the details, this is still ongoing and developing, and I am very suspicious of the government to begin with on all levels particularly when it involves any globalist agendas. I think we should wait until all the facts are out first.
No, he is good at exposing these radical tyrannical governments for what they are and earning support from the international community which were instrumental in keeping this treasure alive.
JJE
Should Apple or phone companies be held responsible for providing the tools that allow Telegram to work? They provide the access so maybe arrest their CEOs.
They allow it to be downloaded and installed right now, even with this nasty stiff allegedly being done outlined above. Telegram is on the Apple Store at you read this.
Truth is it isn't about that is it: rather free speech is encouraged only as long as it doesn't step on someone's toes and cause problems, then it needs to be censored.
wallace
Never been on Telegram even once.
JJE
Give it a try - this arrest episode and resulting news bubble has people downloading it in record amounts.
And why not - if the powers that be are desperate to censor it that bad, it must be doing something right.