Pavel Durov

It's all encrypted in the way that is undecipherable.

That was very important for us.

That's why we can say with confidence there hasn't been

ever a leakage of data, any leak of data from Telegram, not in terms of private messages, not in terms of, say, contact lists.

No.

We design a system in a way that's impossible.

It will require us to change the system, and we won't do that because we made a promise to our users.

We would rather shut Telegram down in a certain country than do that.

I think it's fundamental.

Without the right to privacy, people can't feel fully free and protected.

I guess part of it is just me being me.

I stood up for myself and for my values since I was a little kid.

I always had issues with my teachers because I would point out their mistakes during classes.

And at the end of the day, what's important is to remind yourself that you have nothing to lose.

They can think they blackmail you with something, they can threaten you with something, but what is it they can really do to you?

Worst case, they can kill you.

But that brings us back to the first part of our discussion.

There's no point living your life in fear.

As for Telegram, it's incredibly successful.

But if we lose one market or two markets or pretty much all of the markets, I don't care that much.