Telegram Lawyers Say Proving Data-Privacy Compliance May Take Months
Lawyers representing the messenger giant Telegram have stated that a review of financial records requested by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will take five to seven weeks to prepare.
In a Jan. 9 court filing, the lawyers explained that they must analyze data protection laws in a number of foreign jurisdictions, greatly lengthening the process.
The filing stated that to ensure Telegram’s compliance with all foreign data privacy laws would require an analysis of approximately 4,600 transactions, involving around 770 entities and individuals.
A preliminary sample of roughly 10% of these entities implicated 12 foreign jurisdictions with which it had previous experience, and two it had not yet encountered in its prior work.
The required analysis to perform this work on all 770 entities, along with the subsequent redactions needed to comply with the relevant data privacy laws, could take almost two months, it claimed.
No bank records, but Telegram must demonstrate compliance
As Cointelegraph reported, the court this week denied the SEC’s request to make Telegram reveal its financial records relating to how it spent the $1.7 billion raised in its 2018 initial coin offering (ICO).
However, the court did rule that Telegram must show that these records comply with all of the relevant data privacy laws in foreign jurisdictions. This latest filing is simply stating that this information will take some time to prepare.
The SEC first filed an emergency order against Telegram in October, claiming that the ICO constituted an unregistered securities sale.
Telegram founder Pavel Durov along with two of the firm’s employees were expected to give a deposition in the case earlier his week.