We’re starting to know more about Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s arrest:

Durov was being temporarily detained on suspicion of involvement with distributing child sex abuse material and drugs, money laundering and working with organized crime, according to a press statement released by French prosecutor Laure Beccuau.

When news broke yesterday, I noticed several bloggers write that we didn’t know enough yet to really judge, a restrained take that I appreciate. I figured this might come down to refusal to honor search warrants, but could be deeper too.

@manton I think the question is whether they’re just counting “running Telegram” as all of these things, or whether there’s some direct involvement…

@manton I think the question is whether they’re just counting “running Telegram” as all of these things, or whether there’s some direct involvement…

@david.lynch.wtf Yeah, I'm assuming that there has been some contact between law enforcement and Pavel or his team directly that would lead to this. But I guess we don't know yet.

@manton I first heard about this when Tim Draper was screaming blue murder and thought at the time .. nah .. there’s more to this.

@manton It may be related to Telegram’s open bragging about its distributed-infrastructure-as-subpoena-dodging-scheme. My wild guess is they’ll charge him with hindering one or more investigations, not for refusing to unencrypt anything, but for actively hindering government ability to obtain unencrypted data.