Telegram Says it is Compliant With EU Digital Services Act After Founder Pavel Durov’s Arrest

Messaging app Telegram said that it is fully complies with European Union law and its content moderation practices are within “industry norms.”

“Telegram abides by EU laws, including the Digital Services Act – its moderation is within industry standards and constantly improving,” the company said in a statement. “Telegram’s CEO Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and travels frequently in Europe.”

The statement comes a day after its CEO was arrested at a French airport by local authorities. Durov’s arrest comes as a result of a criminal complaint focused on the platform’s moderation practices, which French law enforcement deems to be insufficient.

While a formal charge sheet has yet to be published by prosecutors, early media reports indicate that prosecutors are assigning culpability to Durov and Telegram for criminal acts that were organized or published on Telegram.

“It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform,” Telegram said in a published statement.

“After news appeared in the media about the detention of P.V. Durov, we immediately requested clarification from the French authorities regarding the reasons and demanded the protection of his rights and the provision of consular access. As of today, the French side has so far avoided cooperation on this issue,” the Russian embassy in France said in a statement.

In its statement, Telegram linked to a March 2024 post from Durov, which predicted that the company would face some sort of challenge in its growth because of moderation practices.

“All large social media apps are easy targets for criticism due to the content they host. I can’t recall any major social platform whose moderation has been consistently praised by traditional media,” he wrote at the time.

“The media coverage of Meta’s moderation efforts has been particularly negative for most of its history. Interestingly enough, Meta was also the first social media company to have reached a trillion-dollar-plus valuation,” he continued. “Telegram will likely have to go through similar growth stages before it surpasses legacy platforms.”

Many in the crypto community have expressed support for Durov, with Tron’s Justin Sun offering to donate $1 million to a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) dedicated to working towards Durov’s release if “it’s created in a decentralized way with enough community support.”

Meanwhile, Toncoin (TON) has slowed its losses and is down 2.45% on-day, according to CoinDesk Indices data.

UPDATE (Aug. 26, 06:00 UTC): Adds statement from Russian Embassy in France.