By Inti Landauro and Sudip Kar-Gupta
PARIS, Feb 3 (Reuters) – French police raided the offices of Elon Musk’s social media network X and prosecutors ordered the tech billionaire to face questions in April related to a widening investigation into the platform, the Paris prosecutor’s office said on Tuesday.
The raid and the summoning of Musk – which could further increase tensions between Europe and the U.S. over big tech and free speech – are linked to a year-long investigation into suspected abuse of algorithms and fraudulent data extraction by X or its executives.
In a statement the Paris prosecutor’s office said it was widening that investigation following complaints over the functioning of X’s artificial intelligence chatbot Grok.
INVESTIGATION INCLUDES SEXUALLY EXPLICIT DEEPFAKES
The probe will now also investigate alleged complicity in the “detention and diffusion” of images of a child‑pornographic nature and the violation of a person’s image rights with sexually explicit deepfakes, among other potential crimes.
Musk and former CEO Linda Yaccarino were summoned to a hearing on April 20. Other X staff were also summoned as witnesses.
There was no immediate comment from X. In July, Musk denied the initial accusations and said French prosecutors were launching a “politically-motivated criminal investigation”.
“At this stage, the conduct of this investigation is part of a constructive approach, with the aim of ultimately ensuring that the X platform complies with French laws, insofar as it operates on national territory,” the prosecutor’s office said.
Such summons are mandatory, though they are harder to enforce on people who do not live in France.
After such a hearing, authorities can decide to either shelve or continue the probe, and potentially put suspects in custody.
PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE QUITTING X
The prosecutor’s cybercrime unit is conducting the investigation together with the French police’s own cybercrime unit and Europol.
The Paris prosecutor’s office said it launched the investigation after being contacted by a lawmaker alleging that biased algorithms in X were likely to have distorted the operation of an automated data processing system.
“Glad to see that my complaint from January 2025 is yielding results!” that lawmaker, Eric Bothorel, said on X. “In Europe, and particularly in France, the Rule of Law means that no one is above the law.”
The prosecutor’s office also said it was leaving the X social media platform and would communicate on LinkedIn and Instagram from now on. LinkedIn belongs to Microsoft and Instagram to Meta.
(Additional reporting by Gabriel Stargardter; Writing by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Alex Richardson and Richard Lough)
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