Russia's investigation into Telegram has escalated further. The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) announced that it has charged Pavel Durov with aiding and abetting terrorism and has placed him on an international arrest warrant. As Telegram is a key distribution channel for the crypto community and on-chain applications, this news has quickly spread to the TON ecosystem.
The allegations involve channels and robots.
According to the Russian side, Telegram has not deleted some channels, groups, and bot accounts, tools that have been allegedly used by Ukrainian intelligence and extremist groups to coordinate sabotage, attacks, and online scams within Russia.
Russia stated that the charge could lead to life imprisonment. However, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) did not specify whether it had applied for an Interpol Red Notice. Even if an application had been made, a Red Notice is not equivalent to an international arrest warrant.
The investigation began in February of this year.
This case escalated after an investigation was launched in February of this year, when Russia began restricting some of Telegram's operations there. According to Russian media outlet Interfax, Telegram has already been fined over 100 million rubles (approximately $1.25 million) this year for failing to remove content prohibited by Russian law.
In terms of platform influence, Telegram remains one of the most important traffic portals in the crypto industry. Numerous project communities, trading groups, automated bots, and blockchain-based mini-apps rely on this platform to reach users.
TON ecosystem receives simultaneous attention
Telegram maintains a close connection with The Open Network (TON). This network supports payments, tokenized assets, and mini-apps, and leverages Telegram's user base to expand its use cases.
The report mentions that the native token of TON was renamed Gram from Toncoin in June. Durov also stated earlier this month that Telegram will roll out a native, non-custodial Gram wallet feature within the app to all users.
At the time of the announcement, Gram was trading at $1.42, down approximately 2.4% in 24 hours. Market focus is not only on the token price, but also on whether the continued regulatory and legal pressure on Telegram will affect the distribution of related wallets, payments, and applications.
