The Important Stories investigation seemingly contradicts Durov’s public claims.
Pavel Durov, co-founder and CEO of Telegram, reportedly entered Russia more than 50 times between 2015 and 2021, according to an Aug. 27 report by Important Stories, an independent Russian-language news outlet.
The report cites data on Durov’s movements leaked from the Federal Security Service of Russia (FSB), Russia’s principal intelligence agency. Cointelegraph has not independently verified Important Stories’ claims..
The data was reportedly leaked no later than Aug. 20 and was hidden once again on Aug. 26. Important Stories said it verified the data partly by speaking to an investigator affiliated with Alexei Navalny, a former Russian opposition leader who died in prison in February.
Durov reportedly did not attempt to conceal his travels. According to Important Stories, he flew between St. Petersburg, Russia, and various European cities on commercial Aeroflot flights and traveled from Russia to Helsinki, Finland, on Russian Railways trains.
The Telegram CEO is of Russian origin and co-founded VKontakte, a Russian social network, in 2006. In 2014, Durov said he refused to comply with the FSB’s request to divulge the personal data of Ukrainian protesters, subsequently resigning as CEO and selling his 12% stake to Ivan Tavrin, the CEO of MegaFon.
Durov left Russia in April 2014. According to Important Stories, Durov’s only publicly known visit to Russia since then was in the fall of 2014, when he returned for several days to sell his data center, ICVA.
According to Important Stories, Durov traveled to Russia repeatedly between 2015 and 2017 and 2020 and 2021. The only period he did not travel to Russia was from 2018 to 2020.
In an April interview with Tucker Carlson, Durov claimed he does not travel to places that do not align with Telegram’s values, including Russia.
“I travel to places where I have confidence that those places are consistent with what we do and our values. I don’t go to any of the big geopolitical powers, countries like China or Russia or even the US,” Durov told the conservative United States journalist.
In 2018, the Russian government banned Telegram, purportedly because the application refused to give state agencies access to users’ encrypted messages. Russia lifted the ban in 2020.
Durov was arrested in France on Aug. 24. He has been accused of failing to adequately moderate illegal activities on the messaging platform, which French authorities claim has been used to facilitate drug trafficking, fraud, and organized crime.
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