Telegram CEO Pavel Durov has been formally charged by French prosecutors and is barred from leaving the country amid their investigation into the Russian billionaire. Durov was officially charged Wednesday with “complicity in distributing child pornography, illegal drugs and hacking software” on the messaging app he founded, as well as “refusing to cooperate with investigations into illegal activity on the Telegram,” The Wall Street Journal .
Durov, who was arrested outside of Paris on Saturday, was released from police custody after paying €5 million in bail. He is required to stay in France “under court monitoring” and check in at a police station twice a week while the investigation plays out. That could take months or possibly years, as The WSJ points out.
That means Durov, who is known for frequently and working from other countries, will be stuck in France for the foreseeable future unless the charges against him are dropped. In an earlier , Telegram called the charges against its founder “absurd” and said that he should not be responsible for the actions of his app’s users.
