Telegram CEO: Shocked by the arrest without warning, French authorities have always had multiple ways to contact Telegram.

Pavel Durov, Telegram's chief executive, wrote in an X post: Last month, I was questioned by the police for four days upon my arrival in Paris. I was told that I may be personally responsible for the illegal use of Telegram by others, as the French authorities have not heard back from Telegram. This is surprising for the following reasons:
1. Telegram has an official representative in the European Union who accepts and responds to requests from the European Union. Its email address is publicly available to anyone in the European Union by searching for Telegram European Union enforcement address on Google.
2. The French authorities have various ways of contacting me for assistance. As a French citizen, I am a regular visitor to the French Consulate in Dubai. Not long ago, upon request, I personally helped them set up a hotline with Telegram to counter the terrorist threat in France.
3. If a country is unhappy with an internet service, it is common practice to take legal action against the service itself. Using pre-smartphone laws to charge a chief executive with third-party offenses on the platform he oversees is a simplistic approach. Developing the technical means itself is hard enough. Innovators will not develop new tools if they know they may be personally liable for the potential misuse of these tools.