Telegram CEO Released By Police, Transferred To Court For Possible Indictment (arstechnica.com) 84
Telegram CEO Pavel Durov is heading to court for a possible indictment after being released from police custody, authorities in France said on Wednesday. From a report: "An investigating judge has ended Pavel Durov's police custody and will have him brought to court for a first appearance and a possible indictment," according to a statement from the Paris prosecutor's office that was quoted in an Associated Press article. Durov was arrested in Paris on Saturday and questioned by police for several days. The French investigative judge will "decide whether to place him under formal investigation following his arrest as part of a probe into organized crime on the messaging app," Reuters wrote today.
"Being placed under formal investigation in France does not imply guilt or necessarily lead to trial, but indicates that judges consider there is enough to the case to proceed with the probe. Investigations can last years before being sent to trial or shelved," Reuters wrote. The judge's decision on a formal investigation is expected today, the article said. On Monday, prosecutor Laure Beccuau issued a statement saying Durov was arrested "in the context of a judicial investigation" into a "person unnamed." The wording leaves open the possibility that the unnamed person is someone else, but the prosecutor's statement listed a raft of potential charges that may indicate what Durov could be charged with. Update: Telegram CEO Indicted in Paris Court .
"Being placed under formal investigation in France does not imply guilt or necessarily lead to trial, but indicates that judges consider there is enough to the case to proceed with the probe. Investigations can last years before being sent to trial or shelved," Reuters wrote. The judge's decision on a formal investigation is expected today, the article said. On Monday, prosecutor Laure Beccuau issued a statement saying Durov was arrested "in the context of a judicial investigation" into a "person unnamed." The wording leaves open the possibility that the unnamed person is someone else, but the prosecutor's statement listed a raft of potential charges that may indicate what Durov could be charged with. Update: Telegram CEO Indicted in Paris Court .
Jesus fucking christ, tell us the charges (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know if it's the mods, the moron submitter, or something else, but here is what he could possibly be charged with:
Police were allowed to hold Durov for up to 96 hours under "the applicable procedure for organized crime offenses," the statement said. That 96-hour period was due to expire today.
Three potential charges are related to encryption. Those charges are "providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration," "providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration," and "importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration."
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It's RIGHT THERE in TFA!!! (Score:2)
The Ars Technica article says that they included multiple statements about failing to moderate CSAM and refusing to work with law enforcement on CSAM/CP investigations targeting Telegram users.
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He's a French citizen arrested on French territory and accused of breaking French laws. Now we can discuss the merits of these laws, but on the face of it, the arrest itself occurred because Durov had been avoiding going to France at all in attempt to evade answering questions. I don't know of many modern legal systems that simply shrug and let someone wanted for questioning dip into their jurisdiction without doing their utmost to haul that person of interest in. If Roman Polanski flew into LAX tomorrow, d
Because Hunter Biden's Laptop! (Score:1)
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His free speech absolutism
IMHO, free speech should be curbed in this way: anyone who's opposed to free speech should have theirs denied in direct proportion to their own opposition to free speech. This way everyone is happy: free speech absolutions due to free speech being protected, and free speech denialists due to free speech being eliminated.
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His free speech absolutism has led to a platform that basically is a cesspool of criminal activity.
Are you referring to the Internet or Telegram?
Further, I'm not sure why some people here are so keen to give billionaires like Durov some sort of free pass.
We don't have any useful facts or data about who did what. All we have is conjecturbation and one sided stories of various LEAs being displeased. Heard enough FBI "going dark" bullshit directed at corporations like Apple using similar loaded language helping terrorists and pedophiles to know not to put too much stock in such claims.
Durov neither deserves a free pass nor an assumption of guilt in the court of public opinion from a bunch of ignorants who read a
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So basically no charges yet.
Something must be lost in the translation because it's sounds like they are throwing things up in the air to see what sticks. These potential charges could possible be applied to any and all software that provides encryption.
Nothing was lost in translation. (Score:4, Informative)
Re: Nothing was lost in translation. (Score:1)
I don't see his testicles either.
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Shock! Horror!
Invade these dangerous non-conformists immediately! Nuke them to a glazed hole in the ground. How can any right-thinking people not be American, without trying to climb over the Trumpian Wall at least twice daily!
Re:Jesus fucking christ, tell us the charges (Score:5, Informative)
Here are the full charges:
Complicity â" web-mastering an online platform in order to enable an illegal transaction in organized group
Refusal to communicate, at the request of competent authorities, information or documents necessary for carrying out and operating interceptions allowed by law
Complicity â" possessing pornographic images of minors
Complicity â" distributing, offering or making available pornographic images of minors, in organized group
Complicity â" acquiring, transporting, possessing, offering or selling narcotic substances
Complicity â" offering, selling or making available, without legitimate reason, equipment, tools, programs or data designed for or adapted to get access to and to damage the operation of an automated data processing system
Complicity â" organized fraud
Criminal association with a view to committing a crime or an offense punishable by 5 or more years of imprisonment
Laundering of the proceeds derived from organized groupâ(TM)s offences and crimes
Providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration
Providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration
Importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration.
My understanding is that you need to file a declaration to import certain crypto into France, but that's a very minor issue (paperwork) compared to the fact that Telegram has repeatedly refused to talk to law enforcement and refused to join child protection schemes. As such Telegram has become the most popular platform for the sale of narcotics and the distribution of child abuse material, and Telegram is well aware because law enforcement has been telling them for years.
Remember that while Telegram does offer E2E encryption, it's off by default and most of the traffic doesn't use it. They can see it all, they just won't moderate it for some reason. Turns out simply ignoring law enforcement is not a good business model.
Makes perfect sense. (Score:2)
Dumbass knew he was wanted, he certainly figured he'd be in and out of France with nobody noticing until it was too late. Having gotten caught, I'm sure he's being released with the understanding that he shouldn't try to leave the jurisdiction. Happens here in the USA all the time (interstate instead of international). Sometimes it's a release on "own recognizance", sometimes it's because the arrestee made bail. Looks like their cutting Durov loose O/R, and I suspect that means that if charges are forth
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Are you implying that the US asked for him to be arrested? That's not an interpretation I've seen before - it's not really all about you.
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But then why would they release him from custody? (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, despite some Jewish ancestry I'm still aware that the state of Israel is no more above the dirty tricks thing than, say, the US or Russia
But if what you're asserting is correct, shouldn't Mr. Durov still be in custody? For that matter, shouldn't he be held incommunicado?
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Who knows what the arrangement was with Durov and the French authorities, but the suppression has been consistent against both Israel's critics as well as the platforms where their material is shared (for example like the leaked files on Telegram mentioned in that article).
Tiktok is also targeted for this reason, just look up the leaked audio of the ADL's Jonathan Greenblatt talking about how Tiktok is a huge part of the "young and old problem" they need to address.
Several journalists or talkers have lost t
Re:Makes perfect sense. (Score:4, Insightful)
Either bring solid evidence or STFU. Your "gut instincts" are useless. If they were so great, you'd be buying the right stocks at the right time and now golfing with Buffett instead of spewing conspiracies on nerd-sites named after punctuation.
Re:Makes perfect sense. (Score:4, Insightful)
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What do you think this is, 2010? There is no "solid evidence" anyone with a TDS can accept that even hints at something bad towards their cause, which is to stop the demon in the image of Trump from causing anguish in their minds. In 2020, the "solid evidence" that the Hunter Biden laptop is real was summarily dismissed by those same people for that same reason. And likewise, I have no intention of providing evidence to people who are hard wired not to accept it.
No, all we have now is psy-op on both sides.
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> have a reasonable expectation that Mr. Durov will be in attendance.
Reasonable my a$$, he'll rocket on oudda there.
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Fuck you.
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Does it not concern anyone that French spies hacked his phone and impersonated the French President Macron, pretending to invite him to lunch, in order to draw him to France?
Nothing you just posted has corrected that falsehood, merely modified the details.
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If you looked at my other source that was posted in this string you would see that the WSJ posts he was hacked as well by the French and United Arab Emirates governments in the past.
Correct, 6 years ago.
Also according this second source, he said "he was invited to have dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron when the police arrested him."
Yes, there are reports that he had plans to dine with the President of France. Claims that he flew to France just to dine with him are beyond dubious.
However, there's no evidence he was lured into the country by intelligence agents on the ruse of having a meal with the French President so that they could arrest him, and nor would there be, since that's not how their system works. That is an amalgam of past events made to look like a sinister plot in the present.
You said, and I quote:
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I did not agree everything you said was accurate. I'll repeat myself:
You mixed up several different events over a 6 year span of time, lumped them into one fabricated event that took place now.
Fuck you.
Nice try.
You said, and I quote:
Does it not concern anyone that French spies hacked his phone and impersonated the French President Macron, pretending to invite him to lunch, in order to draw him to France?
I replied with, and I quote:
However, there's no evidence he was lured into the country by intelligence agents on the ruse of having a meal with the French President so that they could arrest him, and nor would there be, since that's not how their system works. That is an amalgam of past events made to look like a sinister plot in the present.
You're not clever, asshole.
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Like I said- lamest attempt at gaslighting ever.
Initial assertion remains true:
You mixed up several different events over a 6 year span of time, lumped them into one fabricated event that took place now.
You have been moderated correctly.
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This has led to accusations from some quarters that the arrest might be politically motivated. Florian Philippot, leader of the Les Patriots Party, criticised President Macron, suggesting that the arrest was a deceitful act to target defenders of freedom of expression.
Florian Philippot is an outlier. Former vice-president of far-right party Front National, he later created his own small party (he claims 36,000 members) in the right-wing, has made pro-Russia and pro-Trump statements. His last successful local election was in 2015, though he applies at every election (deputy, European parliament, municipal councillor, regional councillor). I wouldn't give much credit to what he says. He is a failed politician trying to stay in the news.
According to a report by Russian state-owned media outlet Sputnik, based on information from French investigative newspaper Le Canard Enchaine, Durov told Paris Police that he was set to meet President Macron for dinner on the day of his arrest.
So it's the pro-Russian Sputnik that
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It's like people can't have more than one article they read on the internet - not all info is in this one article. Yes he ate lunch with Macron 6 years ago, but reports are ALSO that he was invited by Macron for lunch on the night of his arrest, and this was the only reason he went to France.
https://www.firstpost.com/tech... [firstpost.com]
That's not a credible source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Does it not concern anyone that French spies hacked his phone and impersonated the French President Macron, pretending to invite him to lunch, in order to draw him to France? And then Macron claimed it wasn't political, while using his name in their baiting process.
Source? Not in TFA.
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My information was from a Wall Street Journal article below. And yet i've been labeled Troll simply for discussing the topic for some reason.
https://www.wsj.com/world/who-... [wsj.com]
You are misrepresentating what the paywalled article states.
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Could you quote relevant excerpts of the paywalled article?
Impersonating Macron does not make it more political than impersonating the Pope makes it religious. If a judge ordered the phone to be hacked, and the investigators asked help from other police departments with access to hacking tools, that still does not make it political.
The expression political trial, as used in France, means "under orders of the Ministry of Justice" (which is considered a Bad Thing). This is what Macron is denying to have happe
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In the US it is. What does Telegram do. Think about.
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The most persecuted people on the planet, conservatives. Has anyone come for your guns or steaks yet?
Yes, but fortunately for us, they’ve all been Anonymous Cowards.
MAGA came for your guns and steaks? (Score:2)
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The most persecuted people on the planet, conservatives. Has anyone come for your guns or steaks yet?
Yes. I shot them then ate them after cutting them up into little steaks. Oh, wait.
Re:No Free Speech (Score:4, Interesting)
try to create a chat app in the USA that the NSA don't have access and see how the free speech will be silently broken to force some backdoor
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Honestly that sounds more like a fourth amendment issue.
off topic: Mulford_Act (Score:2)
i didn't knew the Mulford_Act, thanks!
amazing how white people being armed on the street is OK for NRA, but when you get black people legally armed on the street, they agree in createng this law!!
sadly Reagan didn't created this for all the US as president
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Zuck got dragged in front of the Senate for a hearing, so I doubt we'd have let Mr. Telegram guy completely off the hook without the government putting the fear of Uncle Sam in him. He probably wouldn't have been arrested though, just threatened with fines. We usually don't arrest CEOs here unless they really manage to upset the wrong people (blatantly ripping off investors or drawing the ire of the RIAA/MPAA will do it).
Allowing criminals to chat on your platform and exchange CSAM is basically just a "ma
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"Allowing criminals to chat on your platform and exchange CSAM"
In every other case slashdot mocks these "think of the children" arguments for bad policy and censorship, but it sounds like you've accepted their premise entirely here.
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I'm not sure how you got that from what I'd written. Security theater and "think of the children" is almost always just about optics. Gotta make it look like you're doing something other than keeping the seat warm when you're an elected leader subject to being voted out.
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No, I'll honestly admit that as an American, my understanding of French politics is basically non-existent. I could certainly make a good guess as to why the USA would've done something similar (TikTok is the closest example), but as to whether France is sincerely going after Telegram because of CSAM or they're just using it as the usual bogeyman is an answer you'd have to get from someone familiar with French politics.
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Re: No Free Speech (Score:3)
Free speech is not free of consequences, and plenty of free speech advocates start getting uncomfortable when other people say bad things about them, even if they are true.
No freedom is truly unbound.
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If I go to your neighbors and tell them you are a pedophile, you have cause for a civil action against me. Guess what, free speech has civil limits.
If I conspire with your neighbors to kill you, even if we're arrested before we've even bought the garbage bags and bleach, guess what, we're guilty of conspiracy to commit murder. Free speech doesn't protect speech in the context of criminal conspiracies.
If I knowingly tell the agent of a foreign belligerent power classified information, I have violated espiona
Re:No Free Speech (Score:4, Insightful)
In USA we have free speech enshrined in the highest law of the land,
Yeah, here's the thing .... have you ever heard of "national security letters"? If not, you should totally check out the gag orders on those things. But gag orders are not just for NSLs, they can be applied to many things. Have you ever heard the term "compelling government interest"? if not, you should check that out too.
It exists nowhere in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, instead, the Supreme Court inmplemented it as a defacto supreme law of the land, and it basically says that the Bill of Rights apply, unless the government has a compelling government interest for them not to. In that case, they do not apply. Take that, founding fathers!
But that's just the government ... the primary censors in the USA tend to be the corporations through which most information flows. Yes, even the ones which receive substantial public funding. The censor at the government's bidding, or factions of the government, and they also censor to further corporate interests.
So effectively, the government has little need to censor the masses when they can just outsource it to a large company instead.
I don't think you understand 'Free Speech' (Score:2)
Have the GRU or the FSB come to talk to you secretly at their headquarters about the things you say? Here in the US it would be the FBI and the CIA - have they locked you up lately for saying unpopular things?
Free speech is not the highest law of our land - it is among the highest laws of our land. As a soldier, I assure you that I have preserved your rights, and that others have come behind me to do the same. I, personally, protected those rights you seem to think you don't have, and I can assure you t
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Have the GRU or the FSB come to talk to you secretly at their headquarters about the things you say? Here in the US it would be the FBI and the CIA - have they locked you up lately for saying unpopular things?
Free speech is not the highest law of our land - it is among the highest laws of our land. As a soldier, I assure you that I have preserved your rights, and that others have come behind me to do the same. I, personally, protected those rights you seem to think you don't have, and I can assure you those rights are still intact.
The thing is, this guy has not been locked up for saying something bad about Macron... He's been locked up for running a platform that distributes kiddie porn and facilitating the sale of illegal narcotics.
I'm pretty sure that those are not protected as "freedom of expression", which I'm pretty sure even in the US is not an excuse for breaking other laws. You cant sell dime bags on the corner and claim the cops cant arrest you for your constitutional right to sell drugs.
There seems to be a concerted e
Re:No Free Speech (Score:4, Informative)
Since you seem to be holding the USA as the highest standard of free speech (newsflash, it isn't), here is what the USA has to say about free speech in France:
The constitution and law provide for freedom of expression, including for members of the press and other media, and the government generally respected these rights. An independent media, an effective judiciary, and a functioning democratic political system combined to promote freedom of expression, including for members of the media.
Freedom of Expression: While individuals could criticize the government publicly or privately without reprisal, there were some limitations on freedom of speech. Strict antidefamation laws prohibit racially or religiously motivated verbal and physical abuse. Written or oral speech that incites racial or ethnic hatred and denies the Holocaust or crimes against humanity is illegal. Authorities may deport a noncitizen for publicly using “hate speech” or speech constituting a threat of terrorism.
https://www.state.gov/reports/... [state.gov]
So yes, there are "hate speech" laws in France. None of which have been invoked against Durov. So there is no stronger freedom of speech protection in the USA that would have prevented him from being arrested for what he did.
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Since you seem to be holding the USA as the highest standard of free speech (newsflash, it isn't)
Look, the USA may fail to uphold its high standards, but I know of no other countries which have such clearly written standards as the basis for their formation as a sovereign nation.
Written standards have a chance at being enforced. "Understood" standards have their definitions change over time... usually negatively.
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Pretty much all western democracies have freedom of expression written clearly in their constitution as well.
France is one of them. It is a right guaranteed not only by the French constitution but also at the EU level.
As I pointed in my post, even the US government acknowledge it.
Also USA:
According to the U.S. Supreme Court, the First Amendment's protection of free speech does not apply to obscene speech. Therefore, both the federal government and the states have tried to prohibit or otherwise restrict obscene speech
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
So as always, freedom of speech is never absolute, and nothing in the US constitution makes it any more absolute than other countries.
Plus, it seems the first amendment doesn't prevent sta
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Look, the USA may fail to uphold its high standards, but I know of no other countries which have such clearly written standards as the basis for their formation as a sovereign nation.
The text of the US constitution is actually pretty weak. It only says that the US government can't make laws restricting the freedom of speech. It never says other actors can't deny you that right. If interpreted narrowly, it could even mean that states and cities could be free to restrict that right.
By comparison, Canada's constitution (much harder to amend by the way), says that everyone has the freedom of expression.
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Free speech and the 1st Amendment didn't help Silk Road. Turns out setting up a market place for illegal stuff isn't covered, and that's basically what Telegram has become.
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Not even the First Amendment protects criminal activity. Just look at the DOJ seizure of domains being used for ransomware and other criminal activities.
People like Durov imagine they live in a world where their wealth can make their libertarian absolutist fantasies real, but, like it or not, the nation state is still a thing, and citizens of any given nation are obliged to obey the laws of that nation, and if they don't, and are foolish enough to set foot in that nation again, or any nation with an extradi
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In USA we have free speech enshrined in the highest law of the land, and that seems almost enough to make it real.
And then: Three former Backpage executives were sentenced to prison for promoting prostitution while disguising their activities as a legitimate classified business. [slashdot.org]
So the EU does not have free speech because it goes after CEOs of companies enabling pedophiles and drug trafficking, whereas the US guarantees free speech even as it goes after CEOs of companies where people advertise their business. Talk about double standards.
Flee the country (Score:2)
And don't come back. Unless this is what you wanted, Durov?
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He'd basically have to join Elon on Mars if he wants to be somewhere without a government that doesn't put some sort of limitations on free speech. Even in the USA, what it says in our Constitution isn't exactly what you get once you open the box. Ask anyone who has been told protest's over, now go home or you'll be arrested [apnews.com] how much "free speech" they think we really have.
Well, you seem to be exercising free speech here. (Score:2)
Usani, his eyes opened, his sails unfurled! (Score:2)
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I never said we have no free speech. I'm not disputing the fact that we certainly do have more free speech than countries that troll through your social media accounts looking for complaints against the party. Even when people do get arrested here for making a nuisance of themselves, it's really more of a blight on your social credit when an employer pulls up your background check than it is a threat of any sort of long-term incarceration. Yes, it's a significant improvement over being pushed out a windo
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At this point he just needs a place where he won't be thrown in jail for what somebody else says on Telegram.
Durov is the new Julian Assange (Score:2)
How does this game out?