U.S. government tried to secretly spy on people by attempting to place a backdoor on the app, Telegram founder claims
The U.S. government wanted a way to secretly access Telegram to potentially spy on its users, according to the app's founder, Pavel Durov.
Durov, who started Telegram in 2013 and is still its CEO, shared this during an interview with Tucker Carlson that aired Tuesday night.
Born in Russia, Durov first became well-known as a co-founder of VKontakte (VK), which is often called Russia's version of Facebook. He told Carlson that he left VK and fled Russia in 2013 because the Kremlin pressured him to hand over personal data of Ukrainian pro-democracy protesters.
Durov denied any connections between Telegram, which is widely used in Russia, especially by pro-Kremlin military bloggers, and the Russian government under President Vladimir Putin. However, he also said he has felt "pressured" by the U.S. government in the past.
"We get too much attention from, you know, the FBI, the security agencies, whenever we came to the U.S.," Durov told Carlson. He then claimed that the U.S. government tried to convince a Telegram engineer to show them how to spy on users.
Durov shared that during his last visit to America, he brought "an engineer that is working for Telegram, and there was an attempt to secretly hire my engineer behind my back by cyber security officers or agents..." When Carlson asked if the U.S. government really tried to hire his engineer, Durov replied, "That's my understanding."
"To write code for them or to break into Telegram?" Carlson asked.
"They were curious to learn which open source libraries are integrated to the Telegram app. You know, on the client side," Durov said. "And they were trying to persuade him to use certain open source tools that he would then integrate into the Telegram code that, in my understanding, would serve as backdoors."
"Backdoor" is a term for a method used to bypass authorization in order to access protected data.
Carlson then asked Durov if adding a backdoor to the messaging app "would allow the U.S. government to spy on people who use Telegram."
"The U.S. government, or maybe any other government, because a backdoor is a backdoor regardless of who is using it. That's right," he said.
The American journalist then said Durov's claim was "a little surprising to hear" and "offensive." "You're confident that happened?" Carlson asked.
"Yes. There is no reason for my engineer to make up the stories," Durov replied.
The CEO said he believes his engineer because he has "personally experienced similar pressure in the U.S whenever I would go to the U.S."
"I would have two FBI agents greeting me at the airport, asking questions," Durov said. "One time, I was having my breakfast at 9 a.m., and the FBI showed up at my house that I was renting. And that was quite surprising. And I thought, you know, we're getting too much attention here."
Carlson asked if the agents approached Durov because they thought he might have done something illegal.
"No. They were interested to learn more about Telegram. They knew I left Russia. They knew what we were doing, but they wanted details. And my understanding is that they wanted to establish a relationship," he said.
Durov continued: "I understand they were doing their job. It's just that for us, running a privacy-focused social media platform, that probably wasn't the best environment to be in. We want to be focused on what we do, not on the government relations of that sort."
The tech boss said he got letters from two members of Congress after the January 6, 2021, riots at the U.S. Capitol. One letter was from a Democrat asking for data on Telegram users who were involved in the riots. The other letter was from a Republican, telling him not to share any data related to the events.
Both letters warned Durov that he would break the U.S. Constitution if he didn’t follow their requests. Durov told Carlson that Telegram decided to "ignore them, because it's such a complicated matter related to internal politics in the U.S."
Law enforcement agents arrested Durov at Le Bourget Airport near Paris. He was arriving on his private jet from Azerbaijan.
News sources said an arrest warrant was issued for Durov because of an investigation into whether he didn’t stop illegal activities like drug trafficking, terrorism promotion, and fraud on Telegram.
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