Billionaire Telegram founder branded 'the Russian Mark Zuckerberg' revealed he has over 100 children before arrest
The billionaire founder of Telegram who was branded 'the Russian Mark Zuckerberg' revealed that he had 100 children before he was arrested.
Pavel Durov is the creator of the popular messaging app, Telegram, as well as having founded the social media platform VK.
However, the 39-year-old was forced to leave VK when he refused to comply with government demands to share information about protesters who were active on the website.
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Durov continued to run Telegram from Dubai and was known to regularly travel around Asia and Europe until he was arrested in France on 24 August.
His arrest was reportedly due to insufficient moderation on Telegram and French President Emmanuel Macron even commented on the situation, saying that it was 'in no way a political decision'.
According to a police spokesperson, the investigation involves a lack of compliance with cyber and financial crimes conducted on the app.
Telegram has faced a lot of controversy as it’s an app that’s been used by the likes of Islamic State terrorists all the way to recent UK rioters, who are able to organize and share information in private groups.
Telegram said in a statement that Durov has 'nothing to hide' and that the app abides by EU law and industry standards in regards to moderation.
Prior to his arrest, the tech mogul revealed that he had over 100 children.
Writing on Telegram in July, he said: “I was just told that I have over 100 biological kids.
“Fifteen years ago, a friend of mine approached me with a weird request. He said that he and his wife couldn’t have kids due to a fertility issue and asked me to donate sperm at a clinic for them to have a baby.
“The boss of the clinic told me that ‘high quality donor material’ was in short supply and that it was my civic duty to donate more sperm to anonymously help more couples... Fast forward to 2024, my past donating activity has helped over a hundred couples in 12 countries to have kids.
“Moreover, many years after I stopped being a donor, at least one IVF clinic still has my frozen sperm available for anonymous use by families who want to have kids.”
The billionaire said that he plans to 'open-source' his DNA so his biological children are able to find one another.
He added: “Of course there are risks but I don’t regret having been a donor. The shortage of healthy sperm has become an increasingly serious issue worldwide, and I’m proud that I did my part to help alleviate it.”