Telegram founder Pavel Durov confirmed Telegram will take over primary operational control of The Open Network (TON) from the TON Foundation, according to a March 24, 2025 report relayed by Wu Blockchain via CoinDesk.
The shift covers “network maintenance, transaction validation, and protocol upgrades.” CoinDesk also says the TON Foundation will step back from daily management. It would still keep a role in community governance and ecosystem work, including community outreach and developer grants.
Why it matters
Validators decide which transactions get consensus weight. CoinDesk frames Telegram’s move as a way to streamline decisions and improve technical performance by aligning TON’s upgrade path with Telegram’s product priorities, including “in-app crypto wallets, decentralized storage, and NFT marketplaces.”
The same source also argues Telegram’s tighter control could reduce certain security risks by lowering dependency on external operators. At the same time, CoinDesk flags the trade-off. Validator dominance can raise decentralization concerns, and critics may worry about innovation being squeezed.
Market impact
CoinDesk does not provide market metrics in the source text. What it does lay out is operational power moving from a foundation structure to Telegram’s team.
That change can affect how fast upgrades ship and how consistently wallet and app-layer features track underlying protocol work. For TON users, the key operational promise in the source is that the network should remain fully operational, with CoinDesk citing “no downtime” and unchanged “transaction fees and block times.”
| Topic | What CoinDesk says changes | What CoinDesk says stays the same |
|---|---|---|
| Operational control | Telegram takes over primary TON operations, including maintenance, validation, and upgrades | — |
| Handover | Transition over the next two to three weeks, with new validator nodes and tool migration | Network operations should not pause |
| Fees and timing | — | Transaction fees and block times unchanged |
What to watch next
CoinDesk says the handover will take two to three weeks, with the TON Foundation providing technical support and a joint task force managing the move.
The operational shift also comes with an upgrade roadmap. CoinDesk notes performance goals such as reduced latency and faster confirmation times, plus updates for the developer stack like an updated SDK. That plan is only partially visible in the provided text, so readers should treat any “under one second” target as a stated goal rather than a guaranteed outcome.
Also watch governance. CoinDesk says Durov emphasized that the TON Foundation retains veto power over major governance changes, which is the main stated check on Telegram’s validator control.