Pavel Durov, founder and CEO of encrypted messaging platform Telegram, confirmed that France's foreign intelligence service asked him to ban conservative Romanian voices ahead of the May 2025 presidential election, citing terrorism and child safety concerns.
He refused.
"They met with me—allegedly to fight terrorism and child porn," Durov wrote on X on Monday.
Durov claims the latter subject "was never even mentioned," adding that the intelligence agency engaged in manipulative tactics, despite having other intentions.
"Their main focus was always geopolitics: Romania, Moldova, Ukraine," Durov claimed.
The Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE), France's foreign intelligence agency, allegedly sought IP logs for users tied to political conversations, Durov said.
"Falsely implying Telegram did nothing to remove child porn is a manipulation tactic," he added.
Durov's claims were first made public on Sunday morning, with French officials denying his allegations hours after.
"France categorically rejects these allegations and calls on everyone to exercise responsibility and respect for Romanian democracy," the country's Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs stated on X.
Decrypt reached out to the ministry for further comment. Telegram's press office did not immediately return Decrypt's request for comments.
Election interference and democracy
When French intelligence head Nicolas Lerner approached Durov, the Telegram head claimed he "flatly refused."
"You can't 'defend democracy' by destroying democracy. You can't 'fight election interference' by interfering with elections," Durov said, exposing the matter on his Telegram channel.
The interaction happened sometime in spring at the Salon des Batailles in the Hôtel de Crillon, Durov recalled.
The concerns around election interference using Telegram as an encrypted means of communication center on Romania's recently concluded presidential elections, where Nicusor Dan, a centrist, defeated George Simion, a nationalist who had publicly claimed to follow President Donald Trump's political style.
Durov claimed French intelligence had asked him to block Romanian conservative voices in the run-up to the elections. France's DGSE acknowledged meeting with Durov, but stated these discussions only focused on "preventing terrorist and child pornography threats" on the platform.
Still, the Telegram founder is no stranger to political scrutiny.
Last year, he was arrested and detained over his alleged role in facilitating criminal content. The case remains unresolved.
The move sparked outrage across the tech industry. Notcoin and Toncoin, two cryptocurrencies associated with the Telegram platform via The Open Network, fell as much as 21% on the news.
Following Durov's arrest, the platform promised to share details and cooperate with authorities.
It's worth noting that Durov's indictment came at a time when Telegram was moving to make crypto-backed financial services a core feature of its platform.
Those ambitions were hampered by their brush with authorities, Seth Goertz, a former U.S. Attorney specializing in cryptocurrency and cybersecurity, told Decrypt at the time.
"The more they go down that road, the more they're inviting scrutiny," Goertz said, commenting on Telegram's crypto and finance ambitions.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
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