6 ms·
Pavel Durov is questioned on 12 charges [pdf]
- anigbrowl 2y agoTranslated by @fs0c131y on Twitter - Complicity - Administration of an online platform to allow an illegal transaction in an organised band, - Refusal to communicate, at the request of the authorised authorities, the information or documents necessary for the realisation and exploitation of interceptions authorised by law, - Complicity - Detention of the image of a minor of a child-pornographic nature, - Complicity - Dissemination, offer or making available in an organised tape of images of a minor of a pornographic nature, - Complicity - Acquisition, transport, holding, offer or disposal of narcotic products, - Complicity - Offer, assignment or making available without legitimate reason of equipment, an instrument, a program or data designed or adapted for the attack and access to the operation of an automated data processing system, - Complicity - Organised gang scam, - Association of criminals with a view to committing a crime or offence punishable by 5 years of imprisonment at least, - Money laundering of crimes or offences in organised gangs, - Provision of cryptology services to ensure confidentiality functions without a declaration of conformity, - Provision of a cryptological means not exclusively ensuring authentication or integrity control functions without prior declaration, - Import of a cryptology means that does not exclusively perform authentication or integrity control functions without prior declaration.
- smt88 2y agoThis seems to confirm speculation that Durov himself is not accused of committing these crimes, but rather than Telegram didn't do enough to prevent criminals from using it in the commission of crimes. The only exception (maybe?) is the money laundering, which seems to be a direct accusation against Durov. It's also fascinating that they also seem to be nailing him for failing to disclose the limitations of Telegram's cryptography.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- hn1986 2y agoIf you manage a message board with illegal activity and don't do anything to take stuff down, you're going to jail. see all the people in the jail who managed sites selling drugs/weapons on Tor. Even worse if it's CSAM like Telegram was doing.
- smt88 2y agoThere are public subreddits about drugs, prostitution, and suicide assistance. Presumably the main issue here is whether Telegram was cooperating with law enforcement, but maybe I'm missing something.
- hn1986 2y agoThat's exactly it but the key differentiator is CSAM is the main and most dangerous one. Reddit doesn't have these problems with CSAM. That's what makes him indefensible. "failing to perform even basic content enforcement on public channels, with instances of known CSAM being detected and reported by our ingest systems".
- Ennea 2y agoThe PDF comes with an English version, too. It's on pages 3 and 4 :)
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- anigbrowl 2y agoAh, I had just seen screenshots of the first 2 pages and then saw the title posted here.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- cube2222 2y agoThose last three are pretty concerning, I don't really understand what they mean: > - Providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration, > - Providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration, > - Importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration. What does "without certified declaration" mean? The others are pretty non-surprising, if the comms were unencrypted and the company refused to cooperate.
- Hizonner 2y agoFrance has at least theoretically had a licencing/declaration/whatever regime for all cryptography software since forever. Presumably they rarely enforce it, but I remember when they passed it. I think it was supposed to involve key-disclosure back doors somehow.
- codedokode 2y agoI wonder, did Google and Mozilla properly certified the cryptogrpahic tools they distribute? And Github is probably the worst offender, hosting thousands of uncertified, illegal cryptographic tools.
- mdhb 2y agoNotably they didn’t run perhaps the worlds most popular child porn distribution network at the same time and didn’t have it all over their devices.
- pera 2y agoFirst time I hear about this as well and I'm not sure if I understand this correctly (because it's in French :p) but it sounds like if your software uses cryptography and you have French users then you need to submit a declaration to some French authority: https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/741830 https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/741830
- layer8 2y agoPages 3-4 of the PDF contain an English version with a non-identical translation: “Pavel DUROV, founder and CEO of instant messaging and platform TELEGRAM, was arrested at Le Bourget airport in the outskirts of Paris on Saturday, the 24th of August 2024, then taken into police custody at 8 p.m. This measure comes in the context of a judicial investigation opened the 8th of July 2024, following a preliminary inquiry initiated by Section J3 - JUNALCO (Fight against Cybercrime) of the Paris Public Prosecutor’s Office. This judicial investigation was opened against person unnamed, on charges of: - Complicity – web-mastering an online platform in order to enable an illegal transaction in organized group, - Refusal to communicate, at the request of competent authorities, information or documents necessary for carrying out and operating interceptions allowed by law, - Complicity – possessing pornographic images of minors, - Complicity - distributing, offering or making available pornographic images of minors, in organized group, - Complicity - acquiring, transporting, possessing, offering or selling narcotic substances, - Complicity - offering, selling or making available, without legitimate reason, equipment, tools, programs or data designed for or adapted to get access to and to damage the operation of an automated data processing system, - Complicity – organized fraud, - Criminal association with a view to committing a crime or an offense punishable by 5 or more years of imprisonment, - Laundering of the proceeds derived from organized group’s offences and crimes, - Providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration, - Providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration, - Importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration. The investigative magistrates in charge of this preliminary judicial investigation have requested a co-referral of the Centre for the Fight against Cybercrime (Centre de lutte contre les criminalités numériques, C3N) and the Anti-Fraud National Office (Office National Anti-Fraude, ONAF) for the pursuance of the investigations. It is within this procedural framework in which Pavel DUROV was questioned by the investigators. The custody period was extended until the 25th August 2024 by an investigative magistrate and can last up to 96 hours (that being the 28th August 2024) given the applicable procedure for organized crime offences, as referred to above.”
- hn1986 2y ago> Complicity - Detention of the image of a minor of a child-pornographic nature Yikes. He's done. If you administer a message board (whether in open-web, dark web or an app) and your board gets overrun with CSAM and you don't take down CSAM after being reported repeatedly, you're going to go to jail. Simple as that.
- octacat 2y agoWhich means any board could be nuked with bots... Kinda reminds me how opposition media got nuked from VK using a similar tactics. Could probably used against hashtags on Twitter.
- voytec 2y ago> Translated It's on page 3 in English.
- belter 2y ago> Translated by @fs0c131y on Twitter The court press release pag 3 and 4 are in English....
- 331c8c71 2y agoComplicity accusations seem to be a stretch. I am not sure if it is the same in French law but according to Wikipedia: > For two persons to be complicit in a crime that does not involve negligence, they must share the same criminal intent; "there must be a community of purpose, partnership in the unlawful undertaking".
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- waihtis 2y ago[flagged]
- surfingdino 2y agoAll those companies cooperate with authorities. Telegram doesn't.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ilrwbwrkhv 2y ago[flagged]
- yawboakye 2y agoi hope i’m misconstruing what complicity means here but how long before law enforcement authorities are putting open source maintainers in jail for complicity, because bad actors profited off their labor to terrible ends? the crypto utilities in go, for example, are extremely easy to use, and a competent programmer could fashion their own comms technology out of just that (i’m slightly exaggerating here). but then would law enforcement come for go’s authors?
- oytis 2y agoI _think_ the question here is whether you operate the platform and are able to help the police if requested. E.g. as a developer of an open-source messenger you are probably are not liable, as soon as you deploy and operate the same messenger, and refuse to provide the data you have you can become complicit. If police asks you to add a backdoor in your software though. As far as I know you are only explicitly obliged to do so in Australia.
- octacat 2y agook, so if someone is hosting a public xmpp server or a forum, they should check their emails.
- oytis 2y agoI guess so? At least if police reaches out to prevent/stop/investigate a crime where you as an administrator are able to help, and you don't respond, it may be argued that you are complicit.
- octacat 2y agoYeah, now I understand why old forums is easier to remove than moderate. Or put on read-only.
- maipen 2y agoSoftware development is already considered a crime in some cases. Tornado cash devs were an example. Satoshi Nakamoto decision to remain anonymous and disappear seems wiser as time passes. I have seen people comparing durov with ross ulbricht which is mind boggling. This man created a messaging/social media app that is not controlled by the powers that be and now he is getting punished for his freedom and independence. Don’t let yourself be fooled. Remember, innocent until proven guilty. They are coming for us next.
- cube2222 2y agoSo, do I understand correctly that they are not cracking down on him for operating an e2e encrypted app that facilitates all those things (CP, organised crime, etc.) (because as many have already argued in comments in previous threads, Telegram is only E2EE in a very narrow use-case, and most likely the comms in question were not encrypted), but cracking down on him for not giving the authorities access to those unencrypted comms that they've requested, which is seen as facilitation of those things (CP, organised crime, etc.)? In other words, Signal is in the clear, because it's E2EE for all purposes and the operators wouldn't have the ability (via reasonable means) to access the data in the first place?
- oytis 2y agoThey did charge him on providing "unlicensed" cryptographic services, and I wonder what the requirements for licensing them are if they are public at all.
- throwaway48540 2y agoNo requirements, it's not possible. That license is reserved for government, military etc.
- oytis 2y agoEncryption is illegal in France? Hard to believe that. Do French websites not use TLS?
- throwaway48540 2y agoEncryption that hides information about who is using it is illegal, yes. Your ISP would provide the information so TLS is okay.
- octacat 2y agoSo, TOR is illegal?
- Canada 2y ago"Import of a cryptology means that does not exclusively perform authentication or integrity control functions without prior declaration." Wow, so me and everyone who has entered France with a laptop or phone in the last 15 years has been guilty of this "crime"?
- gniv 2y agoWhy would you assume Apple etc did not provide these declarations?
- codedokode 2y agoDo open-source projects on Gihub and Linux distributions, available in France, have proper certification? I doubt it. France should arrest developers and maintainers then. And you definitely can find hacking tools on Github as well.
- layer8 2y agoThere are exemptions for development, testing, and personal use, among other things. And the restrictions apply to “products”, which GitHub projects by themselves probably don’t constitute.
- Canada 2y agoYou're right, looks like Apple has a form for it if you public an app in the app store that supports encryption other than what is provided by Apple. I see posts from app developers complaining about it and debating whether to check the "none" box or just leave France out. Presumably Google does the same. Now that I know, I'm actually surprised that Telegram would not have filed that form given its size. How could they have gotten it through Apple's review without doing it?
- rcostin2k2 2y agoI wonder if there is something more behind this operation than the indictment document shows: - the indictment is valid only on the territory of France - Durov, although he knew, flies straight to Paris from Azerbaidjan - Durov was in Azerbaidjan at the same time as Putin
- holoduke 2y agoOf course its politically motivated otherwise Zuckerberg would have been arrested already 100 times.
- lokar 2y agoAppearing to try to comply, responding promptly to questions, etc means a lot to governments. While meta may not moderate well, they do obviously try, and they cooperate with requests (they reply, meet, etc)
- 627467 2y agoExactly and spending all that money on all that. As long as the extortion racket is paid you can operate under theatrics. Regulatory moat anyone?
- holoduke 2y agoAh come on. Plenty examples of misbehavior of Meta. Especially outside of the US.
- lokar 2y agoGovernments get upset when you break the law They get really upset when you also stonewall them
- ahi 2y agoPossible he chose French courts over Russian tea.
- spacephysics 2y ago
- stufffer 2y agoDurov was forced to divest and flee Russia because he refused to censor and share private info on his users with the Russian government. Now he has been arrested in France for refusing to censor and share private info on his users with Western governments. Say what you want be he does stick to his principles.
- ilrwbwrkhv 2y agoHorrible horrible reflection on France. No wonder the entirety of Europe fair so poorly when it comes to innovation and tech compared to America.
- rasz 2y ago>refused to censor and share private info is that why there are tons of examples of russian dissidents being DOXXED on telegram? and non russia aligned OSINT accounts regularly deleted with no reason given?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- AwaAwa 2y agoThis is also a warning to Musk, considering he is trying to turn X into the 'everything' app, and thus far has resisted giving backdoor access to the powers that be.
- mdhb 2y agoHe literally set a new record for how many different countries he gave access to when asked to do so. You’re living in a fantasy land