Avoid Telegram Token, Russian Lawmaker Says as Durov Faces Charges
Key Takeaways
- Russia charged Telegram creator Pavel Durov with aiding terrorism via the 13M-user Dayvinchik bot.
- Gram token fell to $1.38 on July 29 before rebounding to $1.42, remaining down 14% year-to-date.
- Russian officials demand Telegram open a local office, host user data, and cooperate with the FSB.
State Duma Warning on Telegram Transactions
Andrey Svintsov, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, recommended that Russians stop purchasing Gram cryptocurrency. Svintsov suggested waiting for official comments from Roskomnadzor and the Federal Security Service (FSB) before conducting “financial transactions via Telegram channels.”
“No paid subscriptions, no purchase of TON currencies, and so on. In other words, I don’t recommend any transactions within the Telegram ecosystem to our citizens,” Svintsov reportedly told a state news agency.
He reiterated demands that Russian authorities have made of Pavel Durov: Telegram must open an office in Russia, store user data within the country, and “cooperate with the intelligence services.”
Svintsov’s comments followed an announcement that Durov has been charged in Russia with aiding terrorist activity. A statement from the FSB claimed Telegram failed to remove “numerous channels, chats, and bots” that are “actively used by Ukrainian special services, terrorist, and extremist organizations to prepare and coordinate acts of sabotage and terrorism, mass murder, and cyber-fraud in the Russian Federation.” The agency added that these activities have resulted in “numerous human casualties, including women and children, as well as multi-billion dollar material damage.”
The Russian Investigative Committee clarified that the criminal case against the founder of VKontakte and Telegram stems from the dating chatbot “Dayvinchik/Leo,” which has more than 13 million users. The FSB maintains that Ukrainian intelligence agents used the bot to recruit young Russian men while posing as women. Durov, who was detained by French authorities, wrote in late February that Russian authorities had opened a criminal case against him for aiding terrorism.
In June, Durov announced that Gram, the crypto project he founded in 2019, would revert to its original name and that Telegram would take full control. Following the announcement of the charges against Durov, Gram fell slightly, dropping from $1.45 to a daily low of $1.38 on July 29. Within 24 hours, the token had recovered to around $1.42. However, Gram remains well below its May 8 peak of just over $2.70 and is down 14% for the year.
