Telegram CEO Pavel Durov is suspected of 12 crimes in connection with “organized crime”

What is Telegram and who is Pavel Durov?

Pavel Durov was born in Leningrad, Russia. In 2006, he and his brother Nikolaj founded the social media platform VK (VKontakte), a Russian version of Facebook. VK quickly became popular among Russian users in Europe.

In 2014, Durov sold his shares in VK and left Russia. In his own words, he experienced too much pressure from the Russian government to close opposition channels to VK.

The Durov brothers had already established the Telegram messaging service in 2013. This allows you to send encrypted messages, just like WhatsApp. Telegram quickly became very popular in Russia, Ukraine and the former states of the Soviet Union. Russia banned Telegram in 2018 because security services were unable to access data. In practice, Telegram was still accessible.

Pavel Durov has been living in Dubai for years, where Telegram is also based. Apart from Russian, he also has French and Emirati nationality.