“Musk and other executives should face criminal liability,” Bruce Daisley, a former Twitter executive who worked at the company’s UK offices, said days after protesters in Britain tried to set fire to a refugee hotel.
But Telegram has provoked politicians more than any other platform, as the company’s seemingly uncooperative approach has put the messaging app and social media network on a collision course with governments around the world.
The incident in France is not the first time Telegram has faced reprimands from authorities for refusing to cooperate: Telegram was temporarily suspended in Brazil twice, in 2022 and 2023, for failing to cooperate with legal orders.
A similar incident occurred in Germany in 2022, where the country’s interior minister also threatened to ban the app after letters, proposed fines, and even a task force dedicated to Telegram went unanswered, according to officials concerned that anti-lockdown groups were using the app to discuss political assassinations.Several German newspapers, including the tabloid Bild, sent reporters to the Dubai offices where Telegram is headquartered, but found the doors locked and no one there.
Earlier this year, Spain temporarily blocked Telegram after broadcasters alleged that copyrighted content was being distributed on the app. Judge Santiago Pedras of the Spanish National High Court said the decision to ban was based on Telegram’s failure to cooperate with the case.
Arne Mouret, co-founder of encrypted email service Tuta, said the criticism in France is specific to Telegram’s approach. “Of course independence is important, but at the same time, it’s important to comply with requests from authorities if they are legitimate,” he said. “It’s important to show that[criminal activity]is something we don’t want to support in a privacy-focused service.”
France’s decision to prosecute Durov is a rare move linking a tech executive to crimes occurring on a platform in France, but it is not unprecedented. Durov follows in the footsteps of the Pirate Bay founder, who was sentenced to one year in prison by Swedish authorities in 2009, and Kim Dotcom, the German-born Megaupload founder who finally lost a 12-year battle to be extradited to the U.S. from his home in New Zealand in August. Durov plans to appeal the sentence.
But Durov is the first of his generation of founders of major social media platforms to face such serious consequences, and what happens next will be a lesson for them all.
Bastien Le Quellec, legal director at French digital freedom group La Quadrature du Net, didn’t defend Telegram’s lack of moderation, but he fears the case against Durov reflects the intense pressure both social media and messaging apps are now under to cooperate with law enforcement.
“(The prosecutors) refer to a provision in French law that requires platforms to disclose documents that would allow law enforcement to intercept communications,” he said. “To our knowledge, this is the first time that a platform, regardless of its size, has been prosecuted (in France) for refusing to disclose such documents. It sets a very worrying precedent.”
