Telegram, an instant messaging startup launched less than one year ago by Pavel Durov, was honored earlier this week in Berlin at the finale of The Europas, a contest for technology startups that attracted companies from all over the world.
Built in St Petersburg, the startup is now based “on a plane,” Pavel Durov says. The app has exploded onto the messaging space amassing 35 million users in a matter of months, not long after he left Vkontakte (VK.com), Russia’s leading social network.
Durov claims that his service offers users encryption protection too sophisticated even for security agencies to overcome.
Telegram uses the MTProto, a data transfer protocol developed by Durov’s brother Nikolai. According to Durov, the developers have built the system on the assumption that “all communication channels are tapped,” and therefore added enough intricacy to its original code to safeguard users against any breach of privacy. “Even our systems administrators cannot get access to user chats,” Durov said.
Durov and UCP, a major sherholder of VK, are suing each other over the ownership of the application. Durov launched it outside of Vkontakte – entailing potential conflicts of interest, according to UCP, which sees Telegram as a VK competitor.
On his side, Durov accuses UCP and two of his former partners of fraud and of extorting a stake in Telegram.
In last year’s edition of The Europas, two Russian startups walked away with top prizes: Zeptolab, a leading mobile game publisher, and AlterGeo, a Foursquare social network based on geolocation functions. The two companies were judged as the “Best Russian Startups,” with Zeptolab getting two additional awards – the Best Gaming or Social Games Startup, and the Grand Prix.
