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      Telegram’s Top Executive Pavel Durov Reportedly Detained in France

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      The founder of Telegram, an app with more than 900 million users, was taken into custody by the authorities, French media reported.The French authorities on Saturday detained Pavel Durov, the top executive of the online communications platform Telegram, on charges related to the spread of illicit material on the service, according to French news reports.Mr. Durov, 39, a Russian-born entrepreneur, was reportedly arrested at Le Bourget Airport near Paris after landing from Azerbaijan. His detention could not immediately be confirmed.The Russian Embassy in France said in a statement on Sunday that it had asked the French authorities for clarification on news of the arrest.Representatives of the French police and Interior Ministry declined to comment and redirected questions to the Paris prosecutor’s office. The Paris prosecutor’s office, citing an open investigation, also declined to comment.Telegram did not respond to requests for comment.In an interview on Telegram, George Lobushkin, a former press secretary for Mr. Durov who remains close to him, wrote, “This is a monstrous attack on freedom of speech worldwide.”Telegram, with more than 900 million users, has long been on the radar of law enforcement agencies around the world because terrorist organizations, drug runners, weapons dealers and far-right extremist groups have used it for communicating, recruiting and organizing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How Section 230 Is Being Used Against Tech Giants Like Meta

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      A Massachusetts professor has filed a lawsuit against Meta using a novel interpretation of Section 230, a law known primarily for shielding social media companies from liability.Facebook, X, YouTube and other social media platforms rely on a 1996 law to insulate themselves from legal liability for user posts. The protection from this law, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, is so significant that it has allowed tech companies to flourish.But what if the same law could be used to rein in the power of those social media giants?That idea is at the heart of a lawsuit filed in May against Meta, the owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. The plaintiff in the suit has asked a federal court to declare that a little-used part of Section 230 makes it permissible for him to release his own software that lets users automatically unfollow everyone on Facebook.The lawsuit, filed by Ethan Zuckerman, a public policy professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, is the first to use Section 230 against a tech giant in this way, his lawyers said. It is an unusual legal maneuver that could turn a law that typically protects companies like Meta on its head. And if Mr. Zuckerman succeeds, it could mean more power for consumers to control what they see online.“I see and appreciate the elegance of trying to use a piece of law that has made user generated content possible, to now give users more control over those experiences and services,” he said.Section 230, introduced in the internet’s early days, protects companies from liability related to posts made by users on their sites, making it nearly impossible to sue tech companies over defamatory speech or extremist content.Mr. Zuckerman has focused on a part of Section 230 that spells out protection for blocking objectionable material online. In 2021, after a developer released software to purge users’ Facebook feeds of everyone they follow, Facebook threatened to shut it down. But Section 230 says it is possible to restrict access to obscene, excessively violent and other problematic content. The language shields companies from liability if they censor disturbing content, but lawyers now say it could also be used to justify scrubbing any content users don’t want to see.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Scofflaws and Other Hazards on the Roads

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      More from our inbox:Neo-Nazis in Nashville and the Speech QuestionVance vs. the Rule of LawA Ban on Masks? Stella Kalinina for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Traffic Stops Fell in Pandemic, and Didn’t Return” (The Upshot, front page, Aug. 1):Thank you for highlighting the public health crisis that is the rise in traffic deaths across the United States. One point not made is the burden on our children. Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death of children, second to firearms. In my city, Philadelphia, five children, on average, are hit by a car every week.As a pediatric resident physician, I see the devastating outcomes of these statistics in the emergency room and intensive care unit. I advise children to wear a seatbelt, look both ways before crossing a road and wear a helmet when cycling. But people are getting killed even when they do everything right.Plastic bollards separating a designated bike lane don’t work when drivers are willing to barrel over them.We need an evidence-based approach to this public health crisis. Safe road design saves lives. We need to invest in Vision Zero programs to fund structural changes, including speed cameras and physical barriers between cyclists and drivers. Cities need to invest in public transit systems.Culture change takes time. Structural change in the meantime is evidence-based and will work to make all Americans, including our children, safer.Allison NeesonPhiladelphiaTo the Editor:The degree to which American drivers have been ignoring traffic laws over the past several years is mind-blowing. Speeding on highways and parkways is out of control and makes driving an exercise in avoiding catastrophe. It seems as if every other car is drag racing or trying to set a new speed record.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ACLU Must Reinstate Employee Falsely Accused of Racist Language, Court Rules

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      The case put the legal group on the spot for taking positions on free speech and workers’ rights that seemed at odds with its mission.The American Civil Liberties Union lost a case about offensive speech and workers’ rights — over its own workplace.A judge ruled on Wednesday that the A.C.L.U. had illegally fired an employee, Kate Oh, from her job as senior policy counsel. The group had accused her of using language that was racist and that singled out people of color in the office.Michael A. Rosas, an administrative law judge, said that the A.C.L.U.’s accusation that she had targeted people of color “is not borne out by the facts.” He noted that her complaints were not about colleagues but superiors within the organization, and that she had also complained about white managers.Ms. Oh never uttered a racial slur or invoked race, court filings showed. She said that she considered herself a whistle-blower and advocate for other women in the office, drawing attention to an environment she said was rife with sexism and fear. Her frequent, sometimes intemperate, complaints irritated her bosses, she argued, so they retaliated by firing her.The case placed one of the nation’s leading defenders of workers’ rights under scrutiny for violating the very workplace protections it typically seeks to enforce.The judge ordered the A.C.L.U. to reinstate Ms. Oh, who was fired in May 2022, and to give her back pay.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How the Kids Online Safety Act Was Dragged Into a Political War

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      The Senate was set to pass the Kids Online Safety Act on Tuesday, but the legislation faces an uphill battle in the House because of censorship concerns.Last week, the American Civil Liberties Union sent 300 high school students to Capitol Hill to lobby against the Kids Online Safety Act, a bill meant to protect children online.The teenagers told the staffs of 85 lawmakers that the legislation could censor important conversations, particularly among marginalized groups like L.G.B.T.Q. communities.“We live on the internet, and we are afraid that important information we’ve accessed all our lives will no longer be available,” said Anjali Verma, a 17-year-old rising high school senior from Bucks County, Pa., who was part of the student lobbying campaign. “Regardless of your political perspective, this looks like a censorship bill.”The effort was one of many escalations in recent months by those who oppose the bill. In June, a progressive nonprofit, Fight for the Future, organized students to write hundreds of letters to urge lawmakers to scrap it. Conservative groups like Patriot Voices, founded by the former Republican senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, are also protesting with an online petition.What was supposed to be a simple piece of legislation to protect children online has been dragged into a heated political war. At the heart of the battle are concerns about how the bill could affect free speech on culturally divisive issues, which both sides of the spectrum worry could be weaponized under the guise of child safety. Liberals worry about censorship of transgender care, while conservatives are concerned about the same with anti-abortion efforts. The tech industry has also latched onto the same First Amendment arguments to oppose the bill.The controversy stems from the specific terms of the Kids Online Safety Act, or KOSA. The legislation would require social media platforms and other sites to limit features that can heighten cyberbullying, harassment and the glorification of self-harm. The bill would also require tech companies to turn on the highest privacy and safety settings for users under 17 and let them opt out of some features that have been shown to lead to compulsive use.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Supreme Court Declines to Rule on Tech Platforms’ Free Speech Rights

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      The justices returned both cases, which concerned state laws that supporters said were aimed at “Silicon Valley censorship,” to lower courts. Critics had said the laws violated the sites’ First Amendment rights.The Supreme Court on Monday avoided a definitive resolution of challenges to laws in Florida and Texas that curb the power of social media companies to moderate content, leaving in limbo an effort by Republicans who have promoted such legislation to remedy what they say is a bias against conservatives.Instead, the justices unanimously agreed to return the cases to lower courts for analysis. In the majority opinion, Justice Elena Kagan wrote that neither lower appeals court had properly analyzed the First Amendment challenges to the Florida and Texas laws.The laws were prompted in part by the decisions of some platforms to bar President Donald J. Trump after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.Supporters of the laws said they were an attempt to combat what they called Silicon Valley censorship. The laws, they added, fostered free speech, giving the public access to all points of view.Opponents said the laws trampled on the platforms’ own First Amendment rights and would turn them into cesspools of filth, hate and lies.The two laws differ in their details. Florida’s prevents the platforms from permanently barring candidates for political office in the state, while Texas’ prohibits the platforms from removing any content based on a user’s viewpoint.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to Biden Administration’s Contacts With Social Media Companies

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      The case, one of several this term on how the First Amendment applies to technology platforms, was dismissed on the ground that the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue.The Supreme Court handed the Biden administration a major practical victory on Wednesday, rejecting a challenge to its contacts with social media platforms to combat what administration officials said was misinformation.The court ruled that the states and users who had challenged the contacts had not suffered the sort of direct injury that gave them standing to sue.The decision, by a 6 to 3 vote, left fundamental legal questions for another day.“The plaintiffs, without any concrete link between their injuries and the defendants’ conduct, ask us to conduct a review of the yearslong communications between dozens of federal officials, across different agencies, with different social-media platforms, about different topics,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote for the majority. “This court’s standing doctrine prevents us from exercising such general legal oversight of the other branches of government.”Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch, dissented.“For months,” Justice Alito wrote, “high-ranking government officials placed unrelenting pressure on Facebook to suppress Americans’ free speech. Because the court unjustifiably refuses to address this serious threat to the First Amendment, I respectfully dissent.”The case arose from a barrage of communications from administration officials urging platforms to take down posts on topics like the coronavirus vaccine and claims of election fraud. The attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana, both Republicans, sued, saying that many of those contacts violated the First Amendment.Judge Terry A. Doughty of the Federal District Court for the Western District of Louisiana agreed, saying the lawsuit described what could be “the most massive attack against free speech in United States’ history.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Allies Begin First Line of Attack Against Arizona Election Case

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      The challenges from defendants charged with trying to overturn the 2020 election will be a test case for a new but little-known state law aimed at curbing political prosecutions.Allies of former President Donald J. Trump charged in a sweeping Arizona election case on Friday began filing what is expected to be a series of challenges, seizing on a new state law aimed at curbing litigation and prosecutions involving political figures.The law was originally crafted by Kory Langhofer, a Phoenix lawyer who worked for the Trump campaign during the 2020 election but who subsequently fell out of favor with the former president. He said the 2022 law’s intent was to limit politically motivated prosecutions on both sides of the aisle.The new challenges could have the effect of delaying the election case in Arizona for several months, given the timeline for decisions and appeals. The case was brought in April by the state attorney general, Kris Mayes, a Democrat.The 18 defendants have each been charged with nine counts of fraud, forgery and conspiracy. The indictment lays out a series of efforts by the defendants to overturn Arizona’s election results, from the plan to deploy fake electors on Mr. Trump’s behalf, despite his loss at the polls, to the steps some took to put pressure on “officials responsible for certifying election results.”Seven Trump advisers are among those charged, among them Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer, and Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff. Eleven Republicans committed to Mr. Trump who claimed to be the state’s electors, even though President Biden had already been certified by state officials as the winner in Arizona, were also charged.Seven Trump advisers are among those charged, among them Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer.Kendrick Brinson for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More