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Estonia’s Cryptocean sues Telegram founder for copyright violation

The essence of the claim is to recognize the company's rights to the technology and terminate its "illegal" use

TALLINN, June 1. /TASS/. Estonia’s Cryptocean filed an action to the Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky Court against Telegram messenger founder Pavel Durov, claiming a copyright violation during development of the digital identification technology, founder of the Estonian company Yuri Myshinsky told TASS on Friday.

"The essence of the claim is to recognize our rights to the technology and terminate its illegal use," Myshinsky said. "We look to recognition of our rights and will be ready to help after that to the same Telegram in using our technology lawfully," he noted.

The decision to go to court was made after news appeared that Telegram is making "a clone of our product," the businessman said. "The unique feature of the technology is that we found the method of making digital identification accepted simultaneously by banks and crypto-services, such as exchanges," Myshinsky noted. The main challenge now is "long wait for data verification," he added.

It was reported earlier on Friday that Cryptocean lodged a claim to the Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky Court, where it stated that in February the company made a private demonstration of its new information security service, with the copyright obtained in April. Durov, who attended the private presentation according to company’s information, presented his own crypto-passport technology allegedly copying the Cryptocean’s technology in May. Cryptocean alleges it spent about 800,000 euro for its product development.