Is Telegram Still Without Cost? French Authorities Compel Moldova Election Manipulation Through Pavel

Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram, disclosed on September 28 that he faced pressure from French intelligence to eliminate channels related to the Moldovan elections during the 2024 campaign.

In his messages on Telegram and X, he stated that the request was made through a middleman while he was in Paris and was connected to his ongoing legal issues in France.

“This was intolerable on multiple levels,” wrote Durov.

Accusations of election misconduct in Moldova are rampant on Telegram. What’s occurring at the Central Electoral Commission of Moldova? Video evidence shows a worker seemingly destroying ballots from opposition parties, the Patriotic Bloc and Alternativa, while disparaging their voters… pic.twitter.com/iXf1Y6Rh1H

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) September 28, 2025

Durov deemed the method “unacceptable,” asserting that if French agents did indeed contact the judge, it constituted an overreach into the judicial system.

If not, he suggested, it indicated that his legal difficulties were being leveraged for political gain in Eastern Europe. Here’s what you need to know about Telegram, the firm behind TON crypto, and the potential for a European ban.

Did Pavel Durov’s Arrest for Telegram Ignite a Free Speech Battle?

In 2024, when French authorities arrested Pavel Durov, they held him accountable for various negative activities on Telegram: drugs, scams, and even child exploitation. Durov dismissed these charges as “ludicrous,” remarking that only someone irrational would expect a CEO to oversee millions of users.

Crypto Twitter and digital rights organizations transformed the incident into a notable cause, with Durov stating that the entire scenario was “legally and logically absurd,” as it is unreasonable to attribute a user’s misdeeds to the CEO.

Approximately a year back, while I was in Paris, French intelligence reached out to me via an intermediary, requesting my assistance in helping the Moldovan government to censor specific Telegram channels prior to the presidential elections in Moldova.

Upon assessing the channels…

— Pavel Durov (@durov) September 28, 2025

Proponents of crypto asset and organizations focused on digital rights depicted Telegram as a crucial bastion for online free speech, cautioning that the prosecution could serve as a precedent for protocol accountability.

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Europe’s Wider Initiative for Online Control: Is Telegram on the Horizon?

The recent allegations emerge in the context of a broader European initiative aimed at regulating online platforms. In May 2025, Durov indicated that French intelligence also compelled Telegram to suppress Romanian electoral content, a request he declined.

“You cannot ‘protect democracy’ by dismantling it. You cannot ‘combat election meddling’ by interfering with elections,” Durov contended.

In parallel, the EU’s controversial 2025 proposal aiming to supervise all chat messages, including those encrypted, has received endorsement from 19 member states.

(Source – European Distributed ledger Association)

Per Eurobarometer, trust in government across the EU stands at 32%, while just under half of those surveyed now trust digital platforms for communication even more (up from 42% in 2023).

Durov maintains that Telegram will resist political censorship, regardless of external pressures. This raises significant questions regarding who will define the limits of political discourse in a time where encrypted applications influence public conversations.

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