Russian Wanted List Adds Durov; Telegram's PR Team Responds With a Single Finger 🖕

Russia's Federal Security Service charged Telegram founder Pavel Durov with facilitating terrorist activity on Wednesday and placed him on an international wanted list, local news agency Interfax reported. The FSB said Durov was charged under Part 1.1 of Article 205.1 of the Russian criminal code and alleged that Telegram does not remove channels, chats and bots "actively used by Ukrainian special services, terrorist and extremist organizations" to prepare and coordinate sabotage, mass killings and cyber fraud in Russia. The agency said the consequences included deaths among women and children and billions in rubles of material damage.

Minutes after the announcement, the FSB said 46 Russians had been detained after allegedly being recruited by Ukraine through a Telegram dating bot. Soon after news of the charges broke, Telegram's account on X posted a photograph of Durov raising his middle finger, which The Moscow Times reported as a response to the warrant. Durov has not addressed Wednesday's charge directly. When the case was opened in February he wrote on X that authorities "fabricate new pretexts" to restrict Russians' access to Telegram, calling it "a sad spectacle of a state afraid of its own people."

A Russian wanted-list entry is a domestic designation and does not compel other states to act. Durov has not lived in Russia since 2014 and is based in Dubai. AFP has reported that he holds at least four passports — Russian, French, Emirati and Saint Kitts and Nevis. Any Interpol notice would require a separate request and Interpol's own review. Durov was indicted in France in 2024 over drug trafficking, organized fraud and child sexual abuse material on Telegram, and released under judicial supervision on a €5 million ($5.5 million) bond. French authorities lifted his travel restrictions earlier this year, allowing him to leave the country. Durov denies wrongdoing and has called the French case "legally and logically absurd."

Russia began restricting Telegram in August last year and has fined the platform 100 million rubles ($1.3 million) so far this year, mostly for failing to delete banned content, Interfax reported. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that contacts over restoring the service continue, though Telegram's representatives were "not very active." The state has been promoting its own MAX messenger, which activists have dismissed as a "digital trap."

Telegram's native, non-custodial GRAM wallet is being pushed to more than a billion users in a rollout Durov called the largest in history. The token, renamed from Toncoin in June after an 81% community vote, rose 7% on that announcement. GRAM traded at $1.42 on Wednesday, down 2.5%, per CoinGecko data, extending its weekly drop to roughly 12%. Separately, Australia's eSafety Commission commenced civil penalty proceedings in federal court against Telegram for alleged failure to detect and remove pro-terror material, a year-long investigation under the Online Safety Act's Relevant Electronic Services Standard — a move that arrived one day after the Russian charges against Durov.