Paolo Ardoino, the chief executive officer at Tether stablecoin issuer and chief technology officer at the major Bitfinex crypto exchange, has published a tweet in which he shared his concerns regarding the recent arrest of Telegram and TON founder Pavel Durov.

The billionaire was taken in custody at a Paris airport in France upon exiting his private jet after arriving from the former CIS territory. He may face up to 20 years of imprisonment for refusing to cooperate with French law-enforcement agencies and to implement censorship on Telegram. French authorities claim this has led to a massive increase of illegal and criminal activity on the messaging app.

Many cryptocurrency influencers and proponents of free speech have shared their deep concerns about Durov’s arrest.

Elon Musk and crypto influencers support Durov

The cryptocurrency community has reacted to Pavel Durov’s arrest, siding with him and urging French leaders to release him. Owner of the X social media platform Elon Musk was one of the first influencers to react to that news by publishing a tweet about that. He used the hashtag #FreePavel.

Paolo Ardoino tweeted that the arrest of Pavel Durov for “The arrest of Pavel Durov for enabling free speech communications through Telegram” is “very concerning”.

Ardoino believes that the whole global society may lose “he battle to defend freedom of speech and communication” if governments continue to suppress social media platforms that will not yield to demands of strict censorship, such as Telegram or X (formerly Twitter) owned by Elon Musk.

Should this outcome take place, Ardoino pointed out, “dark ages will be our future.”

Justin Sun offers $1 million donation to help free Durov

Founder of the Tron blockchain Justin Sun also took to the X app to stand with the arrested Pavel Durov. The cryptocurrency billionaire believes that the whole cryptocurrency space should show their unity and organize “a #FreePavel DAO” to allow Durov gain freedom by legal means.

Sun stated that he will donate $1 million to this decentralized autonomous organization if it is created indeed and has enough support from the cryptocurrency community. He also tagged Elon Musk and Mario Nawfal (entrepreneur and angel investor) to join him in this plan.