One-off
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Director(s):
SADREEV (Igor), URZHANOV (Aleksander)
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Producer(s):
KOBALT PRODUCTIONS, RBB, WDR
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Territories:
Worldwide.
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Production year:
2025
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Language(s):
German, English, French
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Rights:
TV, NON-THEATRICAL, INTERNET, VOD
On August 24, 2024, Telegram CEO and tech billionaire Pavel Durov was arrested at Paris-Le Bourget airport, making headlines. The controversial Franco-Russian founder is still under investigation, which raises a key question that has long been posed by the EU: to what extent is a platform’s CEO accountable for the content users share on it? The case draws global attention, including from Silicon Valley.
The key question when it comes to Telegram and its mysterious founder is quite simple: is Pavel Durov a hero or a villain? Is Telegram some kind of refuge for extremists and propaganda messages? Or is it an advocate for free speech, privacy and dissidents? Telegram is often referred to as a messaging app, a social network or even a media, but no one is calling it what it actually is: a big disruptor of the offline rules. Just like Uber and Airbnb, only this time, for news sharing. In the age of digital firewalls, geopolitical tech wars, and massive antitrust fines, Telegram continues to operate as if we were still in the early stages of the Internet, back when it was a completely free system, defying borders and state control.