Meet Pavel Durov, the tech billionaire who founded Telegram, fled from Moscow 15 years ago after defying the Kremlin, and has a penchant for posting half-naked selfies on Instagram
Marielle Descalsota
- Pavel Durov, the founder of messaging app Telegram, is worth $15.1 billion.
- The Russian-born tech mogul fled from Moscow 15 years ago and now lives in Dubai.
Pavel Durov, 37, is the founder and owner of messaging app Telegram. The billionaire has been called the "Mark Zuckerberg of Russia."
Durov, who was born in St Petersburg in Soviet Russia, has a net worth of $15.1 billion, per Forbes.
The tech entrepreneur cofounded encrypted-messaging service Telegram with his brother Nikolai in 2013. The brothers were born into a "family of intellectuals," according the Digital-Life-Design Conference website. Durov spoke at the conference in January 2012.
Much of Durov's wealth comes from Telegram, which has 500 million active users and is valued at $30 billion.
Durov did not reply to Insider's requests for comment for this story.
Today, Telegram has become a massive influence in Russia's unprovoked war in Ukraine, with both sides using the app for its secure technology.
Durov's conflicts with the Kremlin didn't end with Vkontakte.
In 2018, Telegram was banned in Russia after Durov denied the Kremlin access to user data. In response to the ban, hundreds of people protested, some of whom were holding signs of Durov illustrated as a saint (pictured above). The app was reinstated in Russia two years later.
Today, Telegram is playing a major role in the war in Ukraine.
Durov vowed in a Telegram post in March to protect the data of Ukrainian users. Durov is of partial Ukrainian descent, according to the post.
"When I defied [the Kremlin's] demands, the stakes were high for me personally," Durov wrote in the post. "I stand for our users no matter what. Their right to privacy is sacred," he added.
Durov now lives in Dubai, where Telegram's operations are based.
Durov moved to Dubai in 2017 and relocated Telegram's operations to an office in Dubai's Media City, per Bloomberg. The network had been previously been based in Berlin.
In an interview with Bloomberg in December 2017, Durov said moving to Dubai afforded him "better ways to use [his] money to benefit society," as the city has no personal income tax.
In January 2018, Durov wrote on Twitter that Telegram is "unlikely to ever consider any location be [its] permanent base."
Durov became a citizen of St. Kitts and Nevis in 2014 by investing $250,000 in the local sugar industry, according to The Moscow Times. The Caribbean nation has no income or inheritance tax, as well as capital gains tax.
Durov was also naturalized as a French citizen in August 2021, according to France's government website.
In a 2020 blog post, Durov spoke out against Silicon Valley, writing that the region has "limited cultural life."
Durov wrote the post in response to journalist and YouTuber Yury Dud's film about Silicon Valley. The film has garnered 45 million views on YouTube.
In the post, Durov listed seven reasons he did not want to move to Silicon Valley.
"The US is not the best place to live or run an IT business," Durov wrote. "Local programmers are expensive, spoiled and often unable to focus on work due to the flow of outside suggestions and ideas," he added.
Durov also described the US as a "police state" and said he was attacked in San Francisco in June 2015 by thieves who wanted to steal his phone.
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