帕維爾·杜洛夫出生於蘇聯俄羅斯列寧格勒（今俄羅斯聖彼得堡），但在義大利都靈度過童年。他的父親瓦列里（擁有語言學博士之學位）受僱於此地。他就讀一所義大利的小學，返回俄羅斯後，就讀了聖彼得堡國立大學語言學院[31]。2006年，他從聖彼得堡國立大學畢業。杜洛夫早年的經歷和事業在俄語出版的圖書《The Durov Code. The True Story of VK and its Creator》中有描述。[32]
Pavel Valeryevich Durov (Russian: Па́вел Вале́рьевич Ду́ров; born 10 October 1984)[5] is a Russian-born business executive, entrepreneur, and investor who is a co-founder and the chief executive officer of Telegram Messenger Inc.[6] and a co-founder of social networking site VK (short for its original name VKontakte; Russian: ВКонтакте, meaning InContact). Since 2021, he has held citizenship in four countries and the European Union.
Durov was listed on the Forbes Billionaires List in 2023, with a net worth of $11.5 billion. His fortune is largely driven by his ownership of Telegram.[7] As of 25 August 2024, Durov was the 120th richest person in the world, with a net worth of $15.5 billion, according to Forbes.[8] In 2022, he was recognized by Forbes as the richest expat in the United Arab Emirates.[9] In February 2023, Arabian Business named him the most powerful entrepreneur in Dubai.[10]
On 24 August 2024, Durov was arrested in France on criminal charges relating to an alleged lack of content moderation on Telegram and refusal to work with police, which allowed the spread of criminal activity.[11]
Durov's father Valery Semenovich Durov is a Doctor of Philological Sciences and the author of academic papers. Since 1992, he has been head of the Department of classical philology of the philological faculty of Saint Petersburg State University.[15] In March 2022, Durov wrote that, "On my Mom's side, I trace my family line from Kyiv. Her maiden name is Ukrainian (Ivanenko), and to this day we have many relatives living in Ukraine."[16]
During his university years, Durov created the highly popular forum spbgu.ru. In 2006, he met his former classmate Vyacheslav Mirilashvili in Saint Petersburg. Vyacheslav showed Durov the increasingly popular Facebook, after which the friends decided to create a new Russian social network. Lev Binzumovich Leviev, an Israeli classmate of Vyacheslav Mirilashivili, became the third co-founder. Durov became chief executive officer (CEO) and attracted his older brother Nikolai, a multiple winner of international math and programming competitions, to develop the site.[19][20][21]
Durov launched VKontakte for beta testing in September 2006. The following month, the domain name Vkontakte.ru was registered.[22] The new project was incorporated on 19 January 2007 as a Russian private limited company. The user base reached 1 million in July 2007, and 10 million in April 2008. In December 2008 VK overtook rival Odnoklassniki as Russia's most popular social networking service.[23] The company grew to a value of US$3 billion.[24]
avel_Durov_at_HL_2010.jpg" class="mw-file-description" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: var(--color-progressive,#36c); background: none; border-radius: 2px; display: block; position: relative; border: 0px;">Pavel Durov at the HighLoad++ conference in Moscow, 2010
In 2011, he was involved in a standoff with the police in Saint Petersburg when the government demanded the removal of opposition politicians' pages after the 2011 election to the Duma; Durov posted a picture of a dog with its tongue out wearing a hoodie, and the police left after an hour when he did not answer the door.[25][21]
In 2012, Durov publicly posted a picture of himself extending his middle finger and calling it his official response to Mail.ru Group's efforts to buy VK.[25] In December 2013, Durov decided to sell his 12% to Ivan Tavrin (at that time 40% of the shares belonged to Mail.ru Group, and 48% to the United Capital Partners). Later, Tavrin resold these shares to Mail.ru Group.[26][24][27][28]
Pavel Durov at the TechCrunch conference in Berlin, 2013
On 1 April 2014, Durov submitted his resignation to the VK board; at first there was confusion about the veracity of his resignation.[29] However, Durov himself said it was an April Fool's Joke on 3 April 2014.[30][31] His resignation message had signed off with "So Long and Thanks for All the Fish", a line from cult novel Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and the title of a later book in the series.[29] A company spokesman said there was an official statement about his resignation that turned out to be a link to the Rick rolling internet meme.[29]
On 21 April 2014, Durov was dismissed as CEO of VK. The company said it was acting on his letter of resignation a month earlier that he failed to recall.[32][35] Durov then said the company had been effectively taken over by Vladimir Putin's allies,[35][36] suggesting his ouster was the result of both his refusal to hand over personal details of users to federal law enforcement and his refusal to hand over the personal details of people who were members of a VK group dedicated to the Euromaidan protest movement.[35][36] Durov then left Russia and stated that he had "no plans to go back"[36] and that "the country is incompatible with internet business at the moment".[32]
avel_Durov.jpg" class="mw-file-description" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: var(--color-progressive,#36c); background: none; border-radius: 2px; display: block; position: relative; border: 0px;">Pavel Durov and Mike Butcher at the TechCrunch conference in San Francisco, 2015
Upon leaving Russia, he obtained Saint Kitts and Nevis citizenship by donating $250,000 to the country's Sugar Industry Diversification Foundation and secured $300 million in cash within Swiss banks. This allowed him to focus on creating his next company, Telegram, focused on an encrypted messaging service of the same name. Telegram was headquartered in Berlin and later moved to Dubai.[24]
In January 2018, Durov announced that, in a bid to monetize the growing success of Telegram, he was launching the "Gram" cryptocurrency and the Telegram Open Network (TON) platform.[37] It raised a total of $1.7 billion from investors.[38] However, these ventures were halted by American regulator U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission which argued in court that Grams bypassed U.S. financing laws and should return the money to investors.[39]
In 2018, Russia attempted to block Telegram, after the company refused to cooperate with Russian security services. A leaked letter by a Federal Security Service employee stated that the block was actually tied to the company's intention to launch the Telegram Open Network.[40] During the attempted block period, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs continued to operate official channels on the app. The block order was lifted in 2020, after two years of block attempts, which the service reportedly evaded using domain fronting. The stated reason was Telegram agreeing to "counter terrorism and extremism" on the platform.[41][42][43][44]
Durov was arrested on 24 August 2024, by officers from France's anti-fraud office, attached to the French customs authority,[45] at Le Bourget Airport outside Paris, immediately after exiting his private jet, following his arrival in France from Azerbaijan, where it's speculated he met with Vladimir Putin[46]—however a source linked to Russian security forces claimed that Putin refused the meeting[47][48] and in a press conference Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, replied that Durov and Putin did not meet.[49][50][51] Durov's arrest was based on an arrest warrant issued by the French National Judicial Police as part of a preliminary investigation.[52][53][54] He was handed numerous complicity charges.[52][53]
Durov is accused of complicity and negligence involving Telegram's use for crimes such as drug trafficking, child sexual exploitation, and fraud.[55] If Durov is convicted of the charges, he could face up to 20 years in prison. It is said that Durov had previously avoided travelling to Europe due to potential legal risks.[52]
Reports also indicate that Durov was on the list of individuals wanted by French authorities, and his arrest was because of his alleged failure to cooperate with judicial officials, including issues related to Telegram's activities.[52] According to French police, criminal activity on Telegram went unfettered through lack of moderators.[56] Natalia Krapiva, a lawyer at the digital rights group Access Now, said that French authorities could try to force Durov to provide Telegram's encryption keys to decrypt private messages, "which Russia has already tried to do in the past".[57]
Durov said that in 2014, he refused to comply with Putin's FSB request to hand over personal data of Ukrainian protesters and opposition leaders during Euromaidan, "because it would have meant a betrayal of our Ukrainian users. After that, I was fired from the company I founded and was forced to leave Russia. I lost my company and my home, but would do it again – without hesitation."[16] During the 2011–2013 Russian protests he refused to censor VK accounts used by anti-Putin activists.[16] On April 16, 2014, Durov publicly refused to hand over data on Ukrainian protesters to Russian security agencies and to block Alexei Navalny's VK page.[70]
In 2024, Durov said that Telegram should remain a "neutral platform" and not "a player in geopolitics".[71]
He is the younger brother of Nikolai Durov, who joined him in founding Telegram and served as lead developer, programmer, and architect of the project.
Durov was naturalized as a French citizen in August 2021, giving him European Union citizenship.[4]Le Monde described the naturalisation as "mysterious", since Durov had not resided in France apart from brief visits. Le Monde suggested that Durov was naturalised via the rarely used "merit foreigner" procedure that is awarded directly by the French government to people viewed to have contributed exceptionally to France's international influence or international economic relations. Durov officially changed the French version of his name to Paul du Rove.[1] In April 2021, he received United Arab Emirates citizenship.[3]
Durov claims to have fathered more than 100 children via sperm donation in 12 nations since 2010.[73][74]
Durov has been described as the Mark Zuckerberg of Russia for founding the social networking site VK, which is similar to Facebook.[63][75][76] In August 2014, Durov was named by the Nordic Business Forum as the most promising leader under 30 in Northern Europe.[77] In 2017, he was chosen by the WEF Young Global Leaders to join their organization, representing Finland.[78][79]
On 21 June 2018, the Union of Kazakhstan's Journalists bestowed an award on Durov "for his principled position against censorship and the state's interference into citizens' free online correspondence".[80] In 2018, Fortune magazine included Durov in their "40 Under 40" list, an annual ranking of the most influential young people in business.[81]
In February 2023, Durov was named the most powerful entrepreneur in Dubai by Arabian Business.[10]
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