Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn • Hacker News Board

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#651

Post by EasyMark » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:36 PM UTC

pathless wrote: post #6

Telegram is genuinely the best general communication platform I have ever used, by far. I really hope he has a good lawyer and this doesn't end up getting essentially murdered for creating it. When you create something that is objectively great, everyone will use it - including bad actors.

Good lawyers won’t make much difference for him as the French government is tired of not being able to look at all our conversations. They want to start scaring people into compliance and verifying all their actions with the government or at least scaring the companies providing a (semi) private experience. This is mostly like just phase 1 of getting the keys that open up telegram servers to 5 eyes by getting Durov under their thumbscrews.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#652

Post by kennedywm » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:37 PM UTC

kombine wrote: post #546

smt88 wrote: post #536

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russian govt officials are protesting his arrest. When an authoritarian govt is calling for the release of someone who runs a "private" messenger, it suggests they have a back door. Otherwise they tend to oppose all private messaging.

No, there is no logical link between the two events. Russian govt can protest that for propaganda reasons: to make a point that Western governments are restricting freedom of speech.

No. What would be illogical is to assume that because Russia might be motivated to protest for the sake of propaganda, that it is not also, or instead, motivated by not wanting to lose access to a hypothetical backdoor.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#653

Post by squidbeak » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:38 PM UTC

whatnotests2 wrote: post #482

squidbeak wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this instance (RT being banned), it's Russia's quite candid strategy to undermine social cohesion in their enemies' societies, using disinformation. Margarita Simonyan and Vladislav Surkov have each bragged about its success. So yes, for social cohesion, when there's a malign external actor poisoning public discourse with the intention of splitting societies, a responsible government ought to tackle it.

The old "enemy of the people" argument.

Information warfare is a real thing, and if you're suggesting governments shouldn't react to it - on the basis that doing so would fall under 'the old enemy of the people argument' - then what you're actually contending is that governments should neglect national defence.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#654

Post by coldtea » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:39 PM UTC

mazambazz wrote: post #29

This seems like the Kim Dotcom situation again. Why are these service providers being punished for what their users do? Specifically, these service providers? Because Google, Discord, Reddit, etc. all contain some amount of CSAM (and other illegal content), yet I don't see Pichai, Citron, or Huffman getting indicted for anything. Hell, then there's the actual infrastructure providers too. This seems like a slippery s…

>This seems like the Kim Dotcom situation again.

At least Kim Dotcom earings and the main utility of the service was indeed based on pirated content. Telegram is huge news/chat/etc app, where the things the mention as "enabling" as totally marginal and coincidental, more like arresting a property owner that owns half of the city because some people sold drugs in a few of the apartments.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#655

Post by coldtea » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:42 PM UTC

philistine wrote: post #428

loceng wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my understanding the arrest warrant only was created while he was en route; sneaky sneaky..

Fuck around and find out. If he legitimately ignored legal French documents forcing him to share information, as the French have declared, he's got got. You don't step foot on a country with an extradition treaty, even less so the country itself, where you're flouting their warrants for your company's data.

[flagged]

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#656

Post by TheRealPomax » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:42 PM UTC

mazambazz wrote: post #29

This seems like the Kim Dotcom situation again. Why are these service providers being punished for what their users do? Specifically, these service providers? Because Google, Discord, Reddit, etc. all contain some amount of CSAM (and other illegal content), yet I don't see Pichai, Citron, or Huffman getting indicted for anything. Hell, then there's the actual infrastructure providers too. This seems like a slippery s…

Except that this is France prosecuting a French citizen for breaking French laws.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#657

Post by coldtea » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:42 PM UTC

threeseed wrote: post #630

celdon25 wrote: post #595

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has already been a form of one for at least 10 years, just happening too gradually for the average person to realize it.

That's the beauty of comments like yours. Because in your eyes it is so gradual the difference between it's happening slowly and not happening at all is imperceptible and impossible to prove.

[flagged]

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#658

Post by thehappypm » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:43 PM UTC

mazambazz wrote: post #29

This seems like the Kim Dotcom situation again. Why are these service providers being punished for what their users do? Specifically, these service providers? Because Google, Discord, Reddit, etc. all contain some amount of CSAM (and other illegal content), yet I don't see Pichai, Citron, or Huffman getting indicted for anything. Hell, then there's the actual infrastructure providers too. This seems like a slippery s…

I think the real difference is the intent. If your platform makes it extremely easy to do illegal things, and you choose not to put in the controls to stop it, and then I think it is fair that government should stop.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#659

Post by marcinzm » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:47 PM UTC

coliveira wrote: post #550

moqmar wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In most jurisdictions yes AFAIK, if those services directly help an illegal activity, and you knew about the illegal activity.

If his was really true for banks there would be a large number of bankers in jail. This number being close to zero, I guess the courts are very lax at charging bankers for crimes.

Banks do a massive amount of tracking and flagging. Even putting a joke “for drugs” in a Venmo field can cause issues. Plus reporting large transactions. There was a massive post on HN yesterday about how often banks close startup accounts due to false positives.

Re: Arrest of Pavel Durov, Telegram CEO, charges of terrorism, fraud, child porn

#660

Post by teractiveodular » Sun, Aug 25, 2024, 8:48 PM UTC

pajeets wrote: post #441

philistine wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fuck around and find out. If he legitimately ignored legal French documents forcing him to share information, as the French have declared, he's got got. You don't step foot on a country with an extradition treaty, even less so the country itself, where you're flouting their warrants for your company's data.

so which country doesnt dubai and uae extradite to?

Despite having lots of treaties agreeing to extradition in principle, the UAE is somewhat notorious for never extraditing anybody anywhere in practice.

https://globalinitiative.net/analysis/a-golden-opportunity-f...