The French government's press release on Telegram CEO Pavel Durov is completely unhinged. It not only references complicity in CSAM, money laundering, organized crime and drug trafficking, but also seems to state that Telegram did not acquire a license to provide "cryptology services".
This is interesting because France apparently *does* have regulations which require licenses for the distribution of cryptology unless used for authentication purposes, as governed by the Code de la Defense.
[Not a lawyer, just researching my way through this hot mess.]
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Full press release:
https://www.tribunal-de-paris.justice.fr/sites/default/files/2024-08/2024-08-26%20-%20CP%20TELEGRAM%20.pdf
Full regulation on cryptology:
https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/loda/id/JORFTEXT000000801164
So basically seems like anything that may have been conducted in a channel by any actor was charged to him?
They are throwing the book and sink at telegram. Classic desperate and corrupt move.
Some other country is pushing them to do it...
That country being the US, according to Mike Benz, who thinks that France would not take such action without conferring with the US since Telegram is used by the US for its own operations.
Julian Assange suffered something similar... As if Sweden cared about some minor offence.. That the "victim" had to be persuaded into reporting 😂
I'm curious as to how many crimes have occured on public land in France? I'm thinking the whole apparatus of their government should be held complicit and be arrested.
France has an institution known as the Foreign Legion. It's quite a reliable indicator of how far the French government will go to get their way. :)
I thought this law had been initiated by Macron, but it's from 2004, before his first mandate.
Failing to file a declaration for cryptology services used for confidentiality can result in up to 2 years in jail and 30k€ fine.
art. 35 "III. - Le fait de fournir des prestations de cryptologie visant à assurer des fonctions de confidentialité sans avoir satisfait à l'obligation de déclaration prévue à l'article 31 est puni de deux ans d'emprisonnement et de 30 000 Euros d'amende."
oops, I wrote "up to 2 years in jail" but it's actually "2 years in jail"
Where do the other18 years come from? or are they just rounding up to 20 years?
2 years is only for one item in the list. By summing up the potential jail time for each "crime", I suppose you should get to approx 20 years.
Imagine going to France for fun and getting jailed forever
Thanks for sharing the link. Mainly looks like complicity and operating a cryptographic system with licensing. The second one presumably should apply to WhatsApp too and Messenger.
How is the cryptology license part unhinged? They were supposed to have a license and didn't have one, so it's illegal.
Why the f would you need an encryption license though
Cause math is le dangerous. Obviously.
It's standard. Even in the US to put an app in the app store you need to answer questions about encryption export
Sure, but if you don’t follow the app stores guidelines, do you go to jail for years?
They just reject your submission
"How is the cryptology license part unhinged? They were supposed to have a license and didn't have one, so it's illegal."
It's one thing to not folow the guidelines and not be approved, it's another to not follow those guidelines (?) and get jail time. It does feel unhinged.
20 years in prison illegal?
To be clear I'm no way siding with his persecutors, but crypto gets classified as arms and yes illegal export of munitions is 20 years easy
Glad you clarified, I was wondering for a moment if you thought this was justice. CEO’s aren’t usually arrested by surprise. Companies might be sued or fined, but this is definitely out of the ordinary.
Simple Use Nostr ..... dont over complicate things...
Well I am a lawyer (not a French lawyer) and morality and right to privacy aside my legal opinion is that he was pretty naive not to expect this to happen.
And I’d go further and say that the French prosecutor does have some pretty robust provisions to rely on there and probably won’t have to work too hard to get a conviction.
People can wail and cry all they want but unless Telegram showed either a willingness to provide chats when asked or else made an effort to restrict access to Telegram in France then there’s not a lot his lawyer can say
This is the main reason I'm convinced that technologies like this need to be maximally decentralized without figureheads that can be used to send a message. Unfortunately, that isn't always a simple task.
Sounds bit like "In order to obtain a license approval, you may only use these choices, we can crack or have builtin backdoors" to me. 🤷🏻♂️
Does bitcoin inc acquired those loicenses? 👀
Whatever. He is a shitcoiner. I hope he gets 20 years. Short $TON
$TON is Pedo coin.
Lock Him Up.
They won't stop until they control all of the communication/social companies. They recognize the power of controlling the narrative and news we see
Pavel is “them”. This is the show trial just to keep us on telegram which is a honeypot if it’s not a bitcoin app just like Musk is a front for military $ and control. This is how they sell the slow uptake authoritarianism.
This isn't anything new. I remember many many years ago you couldn't have Netscape, I believe it was, on your computer. They would arrest you because it had encryption built in.
So, the law means you can use keys for signing or logging on, but not for encrypting (unless registered)?
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