Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov said Monday that the popular messaging platform will now share user details with authorities of those who violate the rules of the app. The move comes following his own arrest by French authorities last month, due in part to a lack of cooperation over illicit activities allegedly taking place on the platform.
Durov said in a post on Telegram that the company had updated its terms of service, and that it is now actively blocking the ability to search for illicit goods and activities via search. Users who still try to share illegal content to be accessible via Telegram search could now have their IP addresses and phone numbers passed to authorities.
"Telegram search is meant for finding friends and discovering news, not for promoting illegal goods," the post reads.
He continued: "We've made it clear that the IP addresses and phone numbers of those who violate our rules can be disclosed to relevant authorities in response to valid legal requests."
Durov said that the Telegram team was using artificial intelligence to make Telegram search "much safer." As a result, "problematic content" now no longer shows up via the app's search bar. The feature allows people to look for groups, chats, and contacts.
French authorities arrested the CEO of the encrypted messaging app Telegram last month. The Paris Public Prosecutor's Office alleged that Telegram was complicit in allowing illegal material to be shared on the platform, and was not responsive to law enforcement requests.
French authorities also alleged that Durov is under investigation for using certain types of cryptography on the platform in the country without permission.
The Russian-born tech entrepreneur paid a €5 million bond ($5.5 million) to be released, but is under judicial supervision and cannot leave France.
Durov prides Telegram on being private, but criminals and fraudsters have allegedly flocked to the platform—which has nearly one billion users around the globe—to sell drugs, push crypto scams, or share child abuse images.
Telegram has gained additional traction across the crypto industry over the last year thanks to the rise of The Open Network (TON), a blockchain network that Telegram originally created but then abandoned in 2020 due to regulatory issues. Development then continued externally via a community of independent developers.
TON now powers an array of popular crypto games on the platform, including Notcoin and Hamster Kombat, plus Telegram itself has increasingly embraced its use of TON over the past several months—including to pay channel operators a share of ad revenue, and to help power its Stars in-app currency.
Edited by Andrew Hayward