Telegram App Owner Leave Fortunes to his 100+ Children

Pavel Durov – the billionaire behind the Telegram – has announced that he will leave his fortune to his children and he has more than 100 of them. 

The controversial founder of the instant messaging platform has an estimated $13.9bn (EUR12.02bn) fortune. This money, Durov told French political magazine Le Point, will be divided between his six “official” children from three different partners, but also the more than 100 babies that have been conceived from his sperm donations. He told the magazine that the clinic "…where I started donating sperm fifteen years ago to help a friend, told me that more than 100 babies had been conceived this way in 12 countries."

"I want to specify that I make no difference between my children: There are those who were conceived naturally and those who come from my sperm donations," Durov said. "They are all my children and will all have the same rights!"

Durov, who is Russian but resides in Dubai, has added a catch though. None of the children will inherit any money for 30 years. "I want them to live like normal people, to build themselves up alone, to learn to trust themselves, to be able to create, not to be dependent on a bank account," he explained.

The 40-year old founded Telegram in 2014 and it quickly gained popularity thanks to its encrypted messaging and emphasis on privacy. However, it has also been controversial. In August last year, French authorities arrested Duval on charges that he had failed to properly moderate the app “to reduce criminality”. This includes child sexual abuse; drug trafficking and fraud content. Duval has denied all charges. "Since 2018, Telegram has fought child abuse in many ways: content fingerprint bans, dedicated moderation teams, NGO hotlines, and daily transparency reports on banned content - all verifiable," he wrote in a post on X.