#FREEdurov Germany

#lifestories

On the 27th of August 2024, I was still in the police station in Paris. It was my third day there. With no devices or internet access, it felt like an extreme digital detox.

That day I was having my regular hours-long interview with the police. Between the questions, I asked my lawyer if my ❤️ Julia would come for questioning too. He said she was expected to, but couldn’t come. I pressed him on the reasons. “Got scared? Left Paris?”, I asked. He hesitated. “She’s pregnant,” he finally said.

It was not the answer I expected at that moment. I remained calm throughout my time in police custody, but this turn of events caught me off guard. After a pause, I said: “Thank you for the good news”. Other people present — the translator, the clerk, the policeman — produced awkward smiles.

I later learnt that the police didn’t know how to break the news of Julia’s pregnancy to me. The circumstances were not exactly celebratory. Julia was alone in a foreign country she’d never been to before. No one knew when I would be able to talk to her again.

Luckily, I was released late in the evening the next day. As I entered the rooftop terrace of the place Julia was staying at, magnificent fireworks erupted right in front of me. Below, the opening ceremony of the Paralympics had just begun.

But the mood was not festive. I learnt that while I was away, the pressure on Julia had been insane. Some blogger started a rumor that she was a “Mossad agent.” Other people came up with the nonsensical idea that it was her posts (and not my chartered flight details) that had prompted the police to welcome me at the airport.

With her devices confiscated, she couldn’t access her accounts on Telegram and Instagram for weeks. Her going radio silent on social media provoked even more speculation. Cyber-bullying aimed at her kept reaching new highs.

Julia stood strong. But, unlike me, she wasn’t used to hostility. She is not made for war.

Two days ago, she was visiting the doctor who monitored her pregnancy. I was in the middle of my 12-hour work day when Julia sent me “😭😭😭” from the doctor’s office. I instantly knew what was wrong.

The little difference a dirty deal makes

❤️ Thanks everyone for your support and love!

Last month I got interviewed by police for 4 days after arriving in Paris. I was told I may be personally responsible for other people’s illegal use of Telegram, because the French authorities didn’t receive responses from Telegram.

This was surprising for several reasons: 

1. Telegram has an official representative in the EU that accepts and replies to EU requests. Its email address has been publicly available for anyone in the EU who googles “Telegram EU address for law enforcement”. 

2. The French authorities had numerous ways to reach me to request assistance. As a French citizen, I was a frequent guest at the French consulate in Dubai. A while ago, when asked, I personally helped them establish a hotline with Telegram to deal with the threat of terrorism in France.

3. If a country is unhappy with an internet service, the established practice is to start a legal action against the service itself. Using laws from the pre-smartphone era to charge a CEO with crimes committed by third parties on the platform he manages is a misguided approach. Building technology is hard enough as it is. No innovator will ever build new tools if they know they can be personally held responsible for potential abuse of those tools. 

Establishing the right balance between privacy and security is not easy. You have to reconcile privacy laws with law enforcement requirements, and local laws with EU laws. You have to take into account technological limitations. As a platform, you want your processes to be consistent globally, while also ensuring they are not abused in countries with weak rule of law. We’ve been committed to engaging with regulators to find the right balance. Yes, we stand by our principles: our experience is shaped by our mission to protect our users in authoritarian regimes. But we’ve always been open to dialogue.

Sometimes we can’t agree with a country’s regulator on the right balance between privacy and security. In those cases, we are ready to leave that country. We've done it many times. When Russia demanded we hand over “encryption keys” to enable surveillance, we refused — and Telegram got banned in Russia. When Iran demanded we block channels of peaceful protesters, we refused — and Telegram got banned in Iran. We are prepared to leave markets that aren’t compatible with our principles, because we are not doing this for money. We are driven by the intention to bring good and defend the basic rights of people, particularly in places where these rights are violated.

All of that does not mean Telegram is perfect. Even the fact that authorities could be confused by where to send requests is something that we should improve. But the claims in some media that Telegram is some sort of anarchic paradise are absolutely untrue. We take down millions of harmful posts and channels every day. We publish daily transparency reports (like this or this ). We have direct hotlines with NGOs to process urgent moderation requests faster.

However, we hear voices saying that it’s not enough. Telegram’s abrupt increase in user count to 950M caused growing pains that made it easier for criminals to abuse our platform. That’s why I made it my personal goal to ensure we significantly improve things in this regard. We’ve already started that process internally, and I will share more details on our progress with you very soon. 

I hope that the events of August will result in making Telegram — and the social networking industry as a whole — safer and stronger. Thanks again for your love and memes 🙏

Mike Benz joins Tucker and breaks down everything you need to know about the Deep State’s involvement in Telegram, and why they arrested its CEO, Pavel Durov.

Watch the full conversation here: https://youtu.be/vKBOrkk1FZE

RT DE, 28. August 2024: "Die Haft gegen den Telegram-CEO Pawel Durow wurde am Abend in Paris aufgehoben, er wurde für die Dauer des Ermittlungsverfahrens unter richterliche Aufsicht gestellt. Außerdem ist es ihm bis auf Weiteres untersagt, Frankreich zu verlassen, und er muss eine Kaution in Höhe von 5 Millionen Euro beibringen. Das teilte die Pariser Staatsanwaltschaft am späten Mittwochabend mit [...] Nach seiner Freilassung auf Kaution muss sich Durow zweimal pro Woche bei der Polizei in Paris melden, so die Behörde [...] Insgesamt soll die Anklage sechs Punkte umfassen. Wie es aus Justizkreisen hieß, droht dem Telegram-Gründer im Verurteilungsfall eine Freiheitsstrafe von bis zu zehn Jahren."
#freedurov
https://freedert.online/europa/217180-pawel-durow-wieder-frei-gericht/

"French authorities issued arrest warrants for Telegram CEO Pavel Durov and his co-founder brother Nikolai in March, according to a French administrative document seen exclusively by POLITICO.
The document indicates the French undercover investigation into Telegram is wider and began months earlier than previously known."
#freedurov
https://www.politico.eu/article/exclusive-telegram-ceo-brother-nikolai-durov-wanted-france-authorities-pavel-durov/

Durow-Festnahme: Was dem Telegram-Gründer zum Verhängnis werden könnte​
#freedurov
https://www.heise.de/hintergrund/Durow-Festnahme-Was-dem-Telegram-Gruender-zum-Verhaengnis-werden-koennte-9848447.html

“You see the Biden administration encouraging France, Macron, to arrest the owner and founder of Telegram, Pavel Durov, who is, as of right now, in a French prison. That’s the hallmark of dictatorship.”

Tucker Carlson and RFK Jr. discuss Durov’s arrest and Europe’s lack of free speech.

Watch the full conversation here: https://youtu.be/8O-ZM0RxG4g

To give you an idea by what kind of "top secret" requests Telegram and other messenger, social media platforms are being spammed by EU governments 🇩🇪🇪🇺
BKA is the "Federal Political Secret Police" of Germany

The Russian Federation is to provide Consular assistance to Pavel Durov, who also is a French citizen. The Russian Embassy in Paris has been activated 🇨🇵🇷🇺