Telegram’s Durov warns of global threat to internet freedom

Durov believes governments around the world are eroding digital privacy and dismantling the foundations of a free internet, and says it will eventually make the current generation “the last one that had freedoms.”

In a post on X, Telegram CEO Pavel Durov said he feared society was “running out of time to save the free internet built for us by our fathers,” as democratic nations front laws that increase state control over online communication.

Durov, who turned 41 this week, said he saw little reason to celebrate. “What was once the promise of the free exchange of information is being turned into the ultimate tool of control,” he wrote. His remarks follow discussions of a European Union proposal known as “Chat Control,” which could give regulators authority to scan private messages on encrypted platforms.

Durov: A dark, dystopian world is approaching while we are asleep

In his post, Durov singled out several Western democracies, accusing them of undermining civil liberties in the name of child safety, only to enforce surveillance and government oversight. 

“Germany is persecuting anyone who dares to criticize officials on the internet. The UK is imprisoning thousands for their tweets. France is criminally investigating tech leaders who defend freedom and privacy,” Durov wrote, referring to his arrest and indictment in Paris one year ago.

I’m turning 41, but I don’t feel like celebrating.

Our generation is running out of time to save the free Internet built for us by our fathers.

What was once the promise of the free exchange of information is being turned into the ultimate tool of control.

Once-free countries…

— Pavel Durov (@durov) October 9, 2025

The Telegram founder argued that the same governments that were once advocates for free expression are silently pushing for mass surveillance. 

“We’ve been fed a lie,” he continued. “We’ve been made to believe that the greatest fight of our generation is to destroy everything our forefathers left us: tradition, privacy, sovereignty, the free market, and free speech.”

“By betraying the legacy of our ancestors, we’ve set ourselves on a path toward self-destruction, moral, intellectual, economic, and ultimately biological. So no, I’m not going to celebrate today. I’m running out of time. We are running out of time.”

EU’s Chat Control law battle continues

The EU’s proposed Chat Control legislation, set to be voted on next week, seeks to combat the spread of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online. It would require messaging platforms such as Telegram, WhatsApp, and Signal to allow regulators to screen messages before encryption.

Privacy advocates, including several technology firms, reckon the proposal would effectively stop end-to-end encryption, which the systems use for securing private communication between users. 

Social media platform X owner Elon Musk said on Monday that the bill could enable “government-instituted mass surveillance.” Signal, one of the most widely used encrypted messaging apps, announced that it would withdraw from the European market entirely if the bill passed.

Durov’s Telegram, which has more than 900 million users worldwide, has not yet said if it would take similar action. But for the CEO, privacy and freedom of speech are undoubtedly non-negotiable.

Grassroots campaign against Chat Control

A grassroots campaign led by a Danish software engineer has galvanized millions of Europeans against the proposal. According to Politico, a website called Fight Chat Control built in August by a 30-year-old engineer from Aalborg, Denmark, known only as Joachim, has encouraged masses to voice their resistance to the bill.

After learning of the EU’s push to pass the CSAM legislation, Joachim launched the site to help citizens contact policymakers directly. Visitors can use the platform to compile and send mass emails warning about the bill to national governments, European Parliament members, and other officials.

Since its launch, the site has drawn nearly 2.5 million visitors, mostly from within the EU. Joachim estimated that millions of emails have been sent through the site, though he cannot track the exact number because messages are transmitted through users’ own email clients.

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