The French offices of Elon Musk's X have been raided by the Paris prosecutor's cyber-crime unit, as part of an investigation into suspected offences including unlawful data extraction and complicity in the possession of child pornography.
The prosecutor's office also said both Musk and former X chief executive Linda Yaccarino had been summoned to appear at hearings in April.
In a separate development, the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) announced a probe into Musk's AI tool, Grok, over its potential to produce harmful sexualised image and video content. X is yet to respond to either investigation - the BBC has approached it for comment.
It has previously characterised the French investigation as an attack on free speech.
The investigation began in January 2025 when French prosecutors started looking into content recommended by X's algorithm, before being widened in July that year to include Musk's controversial AI chatbot, Grok.
Following today's raid, French prosecutors say they are now investigating whether X has broken the law across multiple areas. Among potential crimes it said it would investigate were complicity in possession or organised distribution of images of children of a pornographic nature, infringement of people's image rights with sexual deepfakes, and fraudulent data extraction by an organised group.
New UK Investigation
Meanwhile, UK authorities have given an update on their investigations into sexual deepfakes created by Grok and shared on X. The images - often made using real images of women without their consent - prompted a barrage of criticism in January from victims, online safety campaigners, and politicians.
The company eventually intervened to prevent the practice after Ofcom and others launched investigations.
In an update, Ofcom said it was continuing to investigate the platform and was treating it as a matter of urgency. However, it added it was currently unable to investigate the creation of illegal images by Grok in this case because it did not have sufficient powers relating to chatbots.
Shortly thereafter, the ICO announced it was launching its investigation, in conjunction with Ofcom, into the processing of personal data in relation to Grok. William Malcolm, the ICO's executive director for regulatory risk & innovation, expressed concern over how personal data was potentially misused to generate inappropriate content.
In late January, the European Commission announced an investigation into xAI, Musk’s company, over similar concerns.
'Not a Free Country'
Pavel Durov, founder of the messaging app Telegram, criticized the French authorities, claiming France is "the only country in the world that is criminally persecuting all social networks that give people some degree of freedom." He added that such actions undermine the notion of free speech.
In August 2024, Durov himself was arrested in France over moderation issues on Telegram, but was released in March 2025 following operational changes on the platform.
