ALBAWABA - Pavel Durov, a Russian-born French and Emirati entrepreneur, co-founder and chief executive officer of Telegram Messenger, and the co-founder of social networking site VK, was arrested yesterday in France at Paris Le Bourget Airport.
Who is Pavel Durov
Pavel Durov is a Russian-French 40 years old technology entrepreneur, often referred to as the Russian Mark Zuckerberg. Durov founded VKontakte, a social network, back in 2006 when he was 22 years old. He sold VKontakte and left Russia in 2014 after he refused to cooperate with Russian Intelligence.
In 2014, he was named one of the ’30 under 30’ Nordic leaders. By 2017, he was nominated to join the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders, representing Finland.
According to Forbes, Durov was featured on the 36th annual World's Billionaires list as the youngest billionaire on this list at age 37 with a total fortune of nearly $15.1 billion.
Durov was accused of crimes including fraud, money laundering, receiving stolen goods, possession of narcotic supplies. (Shutterstock)
Durov founded Telegram, a cloud-based, cross-platform, and instant messaging service, in 2013. It is worth noting that the successful application competed instantly with WhatsApp, an instant messaging and voice-over-IP service owned by Meta.
Telegram era
In 2021, the company announced it was considering an initial public offering (IPO) to cope with the massive growth and development. It is worth noting that during the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in 2022, Telegram served as a vital information source for many users.
Durov, the Russian-French founder and CEO of Telegram, was arrested on Saturday in France while he was at Paris Le Bourget Airport. According to sources, he was detained under a police arrest warrant after being accused of crimes including fraud, money laundering, receiving stolen goods, and possession of narcotic supplies.
