According to Cointelegraph, Pavel Durov, co-founder and CEO of Telegram, reportedly entered Russia more than 50 times between 2015 and 2021. This information comes from an Aug. 27 report by Important Stories, an independent Russian-language news outlet, which cites data leaked from the Federal Security Service of Russia (FSB). Cointelegraph has not independently verified these claims, and Telegram did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The leaked data, reportedly hidden again on Aug. 26, was partly verified by Important Stories through an investigator affiliated with Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Durov did not attempt to conceal his travels, flying between St. Petersburg and various European cities on commercial Aeroflot flights and travelling from Russia to Helsinki on Russian Railway trains.
Durov, of Russian origin, co-founded VKontakte, a Russian social network, in 2006. In 2014, 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. He left Russia in April 2014, with his only publicly known visit since then occurring in the fall of 2014 to sell his data centre, ICVA Ltd.
Important Stories claims official data shows Durov travelled to Russia repeatedly between 2015 and 2017 and between 2020 and 2021, with no travel recorded from 2018 to 2020. In an April interview with Tucker Carlson, Durov stated he avoids travelling to places that do not align with Telegram’s values, including Russia.
In 2018, the Russian government banned Telegram for refusing to provide state agencies with access to users’ encrypted messages, a ban lifted in 2020. Durov was arrested in France on Aug. 24, 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.
