Pavel Durov was once hailed as Russia's answer to Mark Zuckerberg. Now he faces a prison sentence in France.
The billionaire co-founder of Telegram, an ultra-secure messaging app with more than 900 million users, is hailed by some as an anti-authoritarian hero and free speech champion who took on the power of Vladimir Putin.
Others see him as a negligent tech company responsible for creating a platform where criminal activity can take place unhindered.
French authorities appear to be in the latter camp. On Saturday, Durov was arrested upon arrival at Le Bourget airport, near Paris, after traveling on a private jet from Baku, Azerbaijan.
The 39-year-old is accused of failing to tackle criminality on Telegram as part of an investigation into alleged fraud, drug trafficking and the promotion of terrorism on the platform - dubbed the "new dark web" by critics.
His arrest is the most telling example yet of a social media executive being brought into line. It raises big questions about the future of networks used by billions of people, their owners, and the regulators and authorities struggling to navigate the digital world.
Telegram's story goes back to its founding in 2013, when Durov and his brother Nikolai set out to create an app that could offer its users complete security and anonymity. To this day, the platform collects no user data beyond a phone number - not even a name, email address or date of birth - and light moderation remains part of its appeal.
It's securely encrypted and doesn't sell data to third parties - Durov, who is reportedly worth $15 billion, is so confident in its security that his website is offering a $300,000 reward to anyone who can prove Telegram messages can be decrypted. In just over a decade, it's become one of the top five most downloaded apps in the world.
Its success is closely linked to Durov's own history. His grandparents were among the tens of millions of Russians persecuted by Joseph Stalin, and his grandfather was sent to one of the autocrat's notorious gulags. Durov himself was born in 1984 in Leningrad, in what was then Soviet Russia, to Russian and Ukrainian parents, and spent most of his childhood in Turin, Italy, where his father worked.
By the time the family eventually returned to Russia, the Iron Curtain had fallen, and Durov enrolled as a liberal arts student at St. Petersburg State University. There, he began to draw inspiration from Silicon Valley and the success of Facebook in particular, and taught himself to program.
After graduating, he founded VKontakte, a social media network similar to the one that Mark Zuckerberg and four of his fellow Harvard students created in the US. Durov himself has often been described as his country's answer to the Meta CEO.
VKontakte flourished and quickly became the country's most popular social platform. Durov has since described it as a "libertarian's paradise" in the unregulated internet market that existed in Russia at the time.
But in 2011, the tide turned. Putin, then prime minister, made it clear that he wanted to return to the presidency, and Durov became the target of Kremlin criticism for refusing to comply with requests to block opposition activity on VKontakte amid mass protests over disputed parliamentary elections. Instead, he ridiculed the situation by posting a meme of a dog in a hoodie with its tongue hanging out - and scans revealing Moscow's requests.
Relations continued to deteriorate in the years that followed. Armed police raided his St. Petersburg apartment, and in 2014 he was forced to leave Russia altogether after being fired as CEO of VKontakte after publicly refusing to hand over user data to Russian security services and blocking the account of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Shortly before his flight, he was reportedly granted citizenship of St. Kitts and Nevis after investing $250,000 in the Caribbean nation's sugar industry. "I would rather be free than take orders from anyone," he has since said of his departure from Russia. In 2021, he was controversially granted French citizenship and, prior to his arrest, had lived primarily in Dubai - after also obtaining a United Arab Emirates passport.
Durov is said to live an ascetic lifestyle, avoiding meat, alcohol, caffeine and sugar. Although he is single and has said he prefers to live alone, he revealed in a Telegram message that he believes he has fathered more than 100 children through sperm donation.
On Instagram, where he has 1.5 million followers, Durov regularly posts photos of exotic destinations and his muscular physique. In a recent post, he quotes the stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius: "A man should stand tall, not be held up by others."
It is difficult to say anything about Durov's identity based on his online presence. He rarely gives interviews, but inscrutability is in Telegram's DNA.
The app is run through a complex network of international servers and shell companies to insulate it from regulation and government interference. In 2018, he confirmed on X, then Twitter, that Telegram is headquartered in Dubai, but it is "unlikely" he will ever consider a location [its] permanent basis."
In March of this year, it was reported that Telegram was close to profitability and was considering an IPO.
Privacy is paramount - it offers users secure messaging and conversations, as well as the ability to create "groups" to communicate with up to 200,000 people or "channels" to broadcast to an unlimited number. It also has a self-destructing "Secret Chat" feature. In 2015, Durov said that since Telegram was founded, "we have not released a single byte of user data to third parties, including government officials."
The app's security has made it a useful source of news in parts of the world where censorship is widespread, and an important tool for pro-democracy activists living under oppressive regimes, such as Iran and Belarus.
It is particularly popular in former Soviet countries, and is widely used by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian citizens seeking uncensored information about the Russia-Ukraine war. It has also been adopted by news outlets including the New York Times and Bloomberg, both of which have Telegram accounts.
But it also has a dark side, with privacy and anonymity features making the platform a safe haven for criminals. Researchers have warned that Telegram is home to a sprawling ecosystem of illegal and violent content related to far-right conspiracy theories, extremism, terrorism and child abuse.
Use of the app surged in the UK after the murder of three schoolgirls in Southport last month, and it has been widely linked to the violent unrest that has ensued on streets across the country, and has been used by far-right agitators to incite and organise disorder. The platform acts to remove illegal and harmful content on public channels, but its website states: "All Telegram chats and group chats are private between their participants. We do not process requests relating to this."
Before the app took a stronger stance against terrorism-linked content, particularly in 2019 after the deadly London Bridge terror attack, it was a platform of choice for Islamic State groups. But experts warn it remains a hotbed of propaganda.
Following Hamas's October 7 attack on Israel, it has been used repeatedly by the group to distribute content. Israel Defense Forces soldiers were also found to be running a graphic, unauthorized Telegram channel. Propaganda, disinformation, and violence are rampant. Channels on the app reportedly sell weapons, drugs, and illegally cloned bank cards.
Telegram, perhaps more than any other major app, has become a digital battlefield - one where authorities, criminals, and Durov himself are locked in a high-stakes confrontation. His arrest has certainly been met with both outrage and relief.
Russian MP Maria Butina said Durov was a "victim of a witch hunt by the West," adding that his arrest means "freedom of speech in Europe is dead."
Meanwhile, fellow tech magnate and advocate of "freedom of speech," Elon Musk, used his platform X, formerly known as Twitter, to call on French police to "FreePavel."
"I don't think we should control people in the way they express themselves... Otherwise we can quickly slide into authoritarianism," Durov himself told the Financial Times in march.
Others clearly take a different view. Durov may see his app as the product of a fierce commitment to privacy and free speech, but critics argue that it has effectively become an online Wild West, acting as a magnet for bad actors looking to circumvent tougher restrictions on rival platforms.
"Enough of Telegram's impunity," a French investigator said on Sunday. As Durov awaits a court appearance, it seems that may yet be the case.
Telegram did not immediately respond to a request for comment