Artem Kliuchnikov and his family fled Ukraine just days before the Russian invasion. Asked about its stance on disinformation, Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn told AFP: "As noted by our CEO, the sheer volume of information being shared on channels makes it extremely difficult to verify, so it's important that users double-check what they read." In a message on his Telegram channel recently recounting the episode, Durov wrote: "I lost my company and my home, but would do it again – without hesitation." Telegram was co-founded by Pavel and Nikolai Durov, the brothers who had previously created VKontakte. VK is Russia’s equivalent of Facebook, a social network used for public and private messaging, audio and video sharing as well as online gaming. In January, SimpleWeb reported that VK was Russia’s fourth most-visited website, after Yandex, YouTube and Google’s Russian-language homepage. In 2016, Forbes’ Michael Solomon described Pavel Durov (pictured, below) as the “Mark Zuckerberg of Russia.” Lastly, the web previews of t.me links have been given a new look, adding chat backgrounds and design elements from the fully-features Telegram Web client.
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