Pavel Durov is a Russian enterpreneur, founder of several projects, most known for VK social networking site, Telegram messaging app and TON blockchain network.

He left Russia in 2014 and was forced to sell VK after refusing to give Russian state agencies access to private user messages. He went on to found Telegram messaging app which faced similar issues, and was blocked in Russia after refusal to provide encryption keys to FSB, which led to several years of whack-a-mole game between Roskomnadzor and Telegram, former trying to prevent access to latter, and Telegram winning this game in 2020, when Roskomnadzor officially gave up.

Reportedly, neither Russian nor Western intelligence agencies currently have access to Telegram encryption keys and encrypted user messages. Pavel Durov was arrested in France on August 24 during his private jet emergency refueling stop, on accounts of assisting terrorism and drug trafficking (and some others, totaling 20) by refusing to provide Telegram encryption keys to French state agencies.