Pavel Durov has been declared an international fugitive — this was announced by the FSB. The founder of Telegram has been charged as part of a criminal case under the article on facilitating terrorist activities.
The agency noted that numerous channels, chats, and bots in the messenger are actively used by Ukrainian special services, terrorists, and extremists to prepare sabotage and mass killings on Russian territory. According to the FSB, all these groups on Telegram have still not been removed.
Recruitment via "Dayvinchik"
According to the FSB's version, Ukrainian special services recruit Russians to carry out sabotage and terrorist acts through a Telegram chat-bot called "Dayvinchik." It was through this channel that part of the crimes reported further by the agency were coordinated.
46 Detained
Over the year, the FSB, together with the Investigative Committee and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, detained 46 individuals aged between 12 and 22. Arrests took place in several regions:
- Leningrad Region
- Chuvashia
- Altai Krai
- Moscow Region
- Ryazan Region
- Sverdlovsk Region
According to the investigation, all those detained committed crimes on assignments from enemy special services. Among other things, they attacked law enforcement officers and acted as couriers, transferring money from deceived Russians to Ukraine.
Criminal Cases and Bot Blocking
The Investigative Committee initiated a number of criminal cases based on the investigation. It was as part of one of these that Pavel Durov was charged under the article on facilitating terrorist activity and declared wanted.
Separately, the FSB reminded that as early as the end of December 2025, the chat-bot "Dayvinchik" was added to Roskomnadzor's registry of banned sites — due to the presence of materials containing child pornography and LGBT propaganda (the movement is recognized as extremist and banned in the Russian Federation). Despite this, according to the agency, the illegal information from the bot has still not been removed.
The case on facilitating terrorist activity is a continuation of the Russian authorities' complaints about Telegram's moderation policy, which have been voiced before. The founder of the messenger has not yet commented on the charges brought against him.
AI Opinion
From the perspective of machine data analysis, the conflict around Telegram fits into a much broader and long-standing dispute between nation-states and cross-border communication platforms. A similar scenario already unfolded in 2024, when French authorities detained Durov on charges of insufficient platform control over illegal content — then it was about drug trafficking and fraud, not terrorism.
end-content
