Pavel Durov’s arrest is not a free speech hill to die on

Disclosure: The views and opinions expressed herein belong solely to the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of crypto.news editorial.

When news broke that billionaire Telegram CEO Pavel Durov had been arrested in France over the last weekend of August, it became a turning point in the global fight for freedom of expression, but it was later followed by accusations that Telegram was protecting users who shared pornographic images and other crimes.

But when the charges were announced, some of the staunchest defenders of the internet’s free-speech ideals took to social media platforms like the X platform (formerly Twitter) to claim that Durov’s arrest was evidence of a sinister plot by French and Western elites behind the scenes.

The irony of Pavel Durov’s arrest in the West is profound and the implications frightening.

Our secret masters are revealing what they are planning and what they fear, and they are unknowingly telling us that speech FREE OF SURVEILLANCE must be a top priority.

— Bret Weinstein (@BretWeinstein) August 25, 2024

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., an independent presidential candidate in the 2024 election, shared a similar view:

France arrests Pavel Durov, founder and CEO of encrypted, uncensored platform Telegram. The need to protect free speech has never been more urgent.

— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) August 25, 2024

Elon Musk described this period as “dangerous times” in a post he shared on X.

French President Emanuel Macron, who has been under fire for claiming the act was a political arrest, said it was a routine law enforcement activity and was not politically motivated. After the revelations in the charge sheet, it became clear that those who immediately came to Durov’s defense could be portrayed by a press army in an ironic, condescending way as defenders of paedophilia.

Arrest

Durov was arrested as part of an investigation by French authorities following allegations that the messaging service had enabled crime on its platform. He said in April that governments were trying to gather information but that the app should remain neutral and not be a geopolitical player.

The self-described libertarian now has a cybersecurity gendarmerie unit, and France’s national anti-fraud police are interrogating him as he sits in custody awaiting his first court hearing.

Jean-Michel Bernigaud (OFMIN private secretary) wrote on Linkedin:

“At the heart of this incident lies the platform’s lack of moderation and cooperation [..] “especially in the fight against pedophilia.”

Ultimately, it’s all about content moderation. https://t.co/Mif5wcGtCK picture.twitter.com/OE2q80fgX3

— Baptiste Robert (@fs0c131y) August 26, 2024

Because Telegram stores data on its own servers, unlike other privacy-focused messaging apps that encrypt the client-side, such as Signal, refusing to comply with data requests could leave the service open to enforcement action.

The wider context

Free speech advocates were already nervous, and perhaps rightly so. The European laws on the books could be seen as an attack on free speech rights, and when free speech advocates heard about Durov’s arrest, they objected to just that.

One such law, for example, is the Digital Services Act, a primary threat to free expression worldwide. It is designed to force social media companies to censor users who share content that authorities deem to be misinformation or extremism. Laws like the DSA are slippery, but Durov’s is not a death knell. Still, too many are lining up to do it.

John Turley, a professor of public interest at George Washington University, told Fox News, “It’s like arresting the CEO of AT&T, because he was using the phone to do the mob’s business.” The problem with Turley’s analogy is that AT&T, at least on the Fairview program, has been known to share information with the government. Elon Musk also draws a line against illegal activity.

Durov is different because he is an “anything goes” tech mogul.

The real battleground is freedom of expression

Instead of helping the fight against censorship, free speech advocates are undermining it, demonstrating their lack of discernment, and throwing themselves into the ring to defend child sexual abuse, even if they do so accidentally. The fight for free speech will not be fought over whether a platform administrator censors information or not, and whether they are arrested or not.

The fight for free speech will be fought—and is already being fought—for our freedom to access privacy-preserving technology without the need for an intermediary. A platform like Signal, for example, encrypts messages on the client side, and the messaging service acts more like a relay, never able to access the encrypted messages sent over its network.

Telegram is a centralized service where its administrators have access to information that could help with serious criminal investigations. If they didn’t want that responsibility, they should have designed better privacy-protecting technology. For whatever reason, they’ve mostly marketed their app as private rather than making it truly private.

The fight for free speech advocates lies elsewhere: to defend decentralized technology that provides privacy without relying on intermediaries who can be bullied and compromised by governments.

Kadan Stadelmann

Kadan Stadelmann is a blockchain developer, operations security expert, and chief technology officer of Komodo Platform. His experience ranges from working in operations security in the government sector and launching technology startups to application development and cryptography. Kadan began his journey into blockchain technology in 2011 and joined the Komodo team in 2016.