Telegram Founder Says Crypto-Like Communication Devices Could Thwart Government Spying

cryptonews.com:

Pavel Durov, founder of the encrypted instant messaging app Telegram, believes that growing government surveillance will drive innovation in secure communication, modeled on cryptocurrency hardware wallets.

During an interview with Tucker Carlson, Durov expressed concern about government pressure on digital communication platforms such as Telegram, saying he prefers to “avoid big geopolitical powers” like China or Russia to maintain their neutrality.

“The world is becoming less amenable. Governments are becoming less tolerant of privacy. And that’s clearly the trend because they have more technological power.” Tucker Carlson Added.

Durov has grown more aware of this due to his influential role as the founder, and he now says, “I assume the devices I use are compromised.”

An outlook that was spurred by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which attempted to bribe Telegram developers to install backdoors for surveillance purposes, according to Durov. Something that left him with “very little faith in the security of US platforms.”

But Durov is optimistic and believes increased oversight will compel innovations in hardware devices built for secure communications “much like how we have hardware wallets to store your cryptocurrency.”

In Traditional banking, transactions between two account holders would be carried out and recorded in a ledger maintained by the bank. This differs from Crypto Wallets which use blockchain technology to record and maintain balances of tokens associated with addresses.

This removes any intermediaries by decentralizing the process, preventing oversight. If the technology is adapted, it could be applied to communications, removing the need for intermediaries like Internet Service