Pawel Durow: Telegram founder, 100 children and half-naked on Instagram

Even with his will, Pawel Durow has now made the headlines. The founder of the Telegram Messenger service, which is as successful and controversial, gave the French newspaper a big interview a few days ago. In it, the 40-year-old talks about his extraordinary life and his anger with the French judiciary. And just mentions that – thanks to sperm donations – he had already generated more than 100 children and that they are supposed to inherit all of them on an equal footing.

Sounds diagonally, but is perfectly part of the biography of Durows, which is rich in extravagance. A little overview.

Before Pawel Durow created one of the most important messenger services in the world, he has already launched another tech giant. With his brother Nikolai, he founded the Vkontakte platform in 2006. The Russian-speaking Facebook variant quickly rose to the dominant social network in Russia and thus became a political factor. Because Durow refused to help the Russian government in the fight against opposition figures and to reveal user data, he was forced to sell his shares in VKTagte in 2014 and to leave the country. In 2013, Durow had already founded the Messenger Telegram in addition to Vontakte, with which he wanted to compete with WhatsApp.

After escaping from Russia, Durow accepted the nationality of the Caribbean island state of St. Kitts and Nevis. For the establishment of Telegram, he only considered Berlin as a headquarters, but then chose Dubai, where the rules for entrepreneurs are clearly lax. In 2021 he accepted the nationality of the United Arab Emirates. According to Durow, Telegram employs around 50 people in Dubai. Telegram sees itself as a safe messenger, whose user data cannot access a government. This not only made the service popular with oppositional, but also for drug dealers, right -wing extremists and terrorists. Telegram has around one billion users worldwide today.

The renowned Forbes-Magazin estimates Pawel Durow’s assets at $ 17 billion. The Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index calls 14 billion. Durow says this is just a theoretical sum based on the value of Telegram, which he does not intend to sell. According to his own statement, Durow has 100 percent on Telegram, but otherwise not much: “I don’t have a house, no yacht, no private jet … I only have a formal suit, but mostly wear sports clothes – usually adidas or nike.” As a telegram boss, he does not pay a salary, says Durow, the money for life comes from Bitcoin investments.

Durow swears by an ascetic lifestyle. He does not drink alcohol, coffee or tea, he says in an interview with Le Point. He does not smoke and stay away from sugar. And a little sport: 300 pushups and 300 squats every morning. The physical result can be admired on its Instagram channel, where it is teeming with an upper body-free muscle photos. Up without in the water, topless in the desert, topless with an Easter lamb on the shoulder. What you do.

Durow has six children from three different women. And then there are his sperm donations, which he has been giving up for 15 years. The clinic told him that he was the father of more than 100 children in twelve countries. In his will, Durow ordered that all children – regardless of whether they are generated in a natural way or treated the same by sperm donation. However, they should only be allowed to come to their inheritance in 30 years. “I want you to live like normal people, that you build yourself, that you learn to trust yourself, that you can create something and are not dependent on a bank account.”

Durow is currently involved in a judicial procedure in France, whose citizenship he also has. In August 2024 he was arrested when he arrived at Paris Airport. The authorities examine the extent to which Durow can be held liable for the activities of criminals on Telegram. It’s about child pornography, drug trafficking and money laundering. In the meantime, Durow was allowed to leave Dubai again, but the procedure is still running. Durow himself describes the allegations as absurd. He stands on the point of view: just because criminals use his platform does not make him criminal.