Elon Musk Summoned by French Probe Over Child Abuse Images and Deepfakes on X

French prosecutors summon Elon Musk over allegations of child abuse images and deepfakes on X

PARIS (AP) -- Elon Musk has been summoned to Paris on Monday, where investigators are looking into allegations of misconduct related to the social media platform X, including the spread of child sexual abuse material and deepfake content. The world's richest man and Linda Yaccarino -- the former CEO of X -- have been summoned for "voluntary interviews," while other employees of the platform are scheduled to be heard as witnesses throughout this week, the Paris prosecutor's office said. It remains unclear whether Musk and Yaccarino will travel to Paris. A spokesperson for X did not respond to questions from The Associated Press and Yaccarino's current company, eMed, did not answer a request sent to the press email. Musk was summoned after a search took place in February at the French premises of X as part of an investigation opened in January 2025 by the cybercrime unit of the Paris prosecutor's office. Musk and Yaccarino have been invited in their capacities as managers of X at the time of the events investigated. Yaccarino was CEO from May 2023 until July 2025. "These voluntary interviews with the executives are intended to allow them to present their position regarding the facts and, where appropriate, the compliance measures they plan to implement," prosecutors said. "At this stage, the conduct of this investigation is part of a constructive approach, with the ultimate objective of ensuring that platform X complies with French law, insofar as it operates within the national territory." Asked whether Musk would risk sanctions if he skipped the hearing, the Paris prosecutor's office declined to comment. French authorities opened their investigation after reports from a French lawmaker alleging that biased algorithms on X likely distorted the functioning of an automated data processing system. It expanded after the platform's AI system, Grok, generated posts that allegedly denied the Holocaust, a crime in France, and spread sexually explicit deepfakes. It's looking into alleged "complicity" in possessing and spreading pornographic images of minors, sexually explicit deepfakes, denial of crimes against humanity and manipulation of an automated data processing system as part of an organized group, among other charges. Grok, which was built by xAI and is available through X, sparked global outrage this year after it pumped out a torrent of sexualized nonconsensual deepfake images in response to requests from X users. Grok also wrote in a widely shared post in French that gas chambers at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp were designed for "disinfection with Zyklon B against typhus" rather than for mass murder -- language long associated with Holocaust denial. In later posts on X, the chatbot reversed itself and acknowledged that its earlier reply was wrong, saying it had been deleted, and pointed to historical evidence that Zyklon B was used to kill more than 1 million people in Auschwitz gas chambers. In March, the Paris prosecutor's office alerted the U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) -- the U.S. federal agency responsible for regulating and overseeing financial markets -- suggesting "that the controversy surrounding sexually explicit deepfakes generated by Grok may have been deliberately orchestrated to artificially boost the value of the companies X and xAI -- potentially constituting criminal offenses," prosecutors said. The Paris prosecutor's office said this could have been done "ahead of the planned June 2026 stock market listing of the new entity formed by the merger of Space X and xAI, at a time when company X was clearly losing momentum." According to the Wall Street Journal, the Justice Department told French law enforcement authorities it wouldn't facilitate their efforts to investigate Musk's X. The newspaper reported that the Justice Department's Office of International Affairs, in a two-page letter last week, accused the French of inappropriately using its justice system to interfere with an American business. "This investigation seeks to use the criminal legal system in France to regulate a public square for the free expression of ideas and opinions in a manner contrary to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution," said the letter quoted by The Wall Street Journal. The letter also said France's requests for U.S. assistance "constitute an effort to entangle the United States in a politically charged criminal proceeding aimed at wrongfully regulating through prosecution the business activities of a social media platform." French judicial authorities didn't respond to requests for comments. Meanwhile, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said it has lodged a new complaint against X with the cybercrime unit of the Paris prosecutor's office, It "targets the platform's policies that allow disinformation to flourish," RSF said, accusing the U.S. billionaire's company of repeated violations of the public's right to reliable information. "Disinformation campaigns are flooding X, some of which have accumulated several hundred thousand views. Although the staff at Elon Musk's platform are well aware of the situation, this has not stopped them from responding to RSF's repeated alerts with automated refusals to remove the content in question," RSF said. "This is a deliberate policy instated by X, and it is incompatible with the public's right to reliable information." ___ Associated Press reporter Kelvin Chan in London contributed to this story.

France summons Elon Musk over X probe

Paris (France) (AFP) - Billionaire Elon Musk has been summoned for a voluntary interview in Paris on Monday as part of a French probe into his social media platform X, though it remains unclear if he will appear. French authorities issued a summons for Musk in February as part of an investigation, launched in January 2025, into allegations that X's algorithm was used to interfere in French politics. The probe was later expanded to include an investigation into X's AI chatbot Grok's dissemination of Holocaust denials and sexual deepfakes. In early February, French prosecutors searched the Paris offices of X, in what the social media giant -- which has denied any wrongdoing -- slammed as "politicized" raids and an "abusive judicial act". At the time, Paris prosecutors also summoned Musk and then-CEO Linda Yaccarino for voluntary interviews as the "de facto and de jure managers of the X platform at the time of the events", a move Musk called a "political attack". Yaccarino resigned as CEO of X in July last year after two years at the helm of the company. In February, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said X employees had also been summoned to appear between April 20 and 24 "to be heard as witnesses". But whether or not those invited for voluntary questioning appear would not be "an obstacle to the continuation of the investigation," the Paris prosecutor's office said on Saturday. Officials have not offered any details on the location or time of Musk's scheduled interview. The French investigation focuses on several suspected criminal offences including complicity in possessing child sexual abuse material and denial of crimes against humanity. The social media company in July called the probe "politically motivated". -'Serious concerns'- The French investigation comes as part of a broader international backlash against Grok after it emerged that users could sexualise images of women and children using simple text prompts such as "put her in a bikini" or "remove her clothes". It generated an estimated three million sexualised images -- mostly of women, though also 23,000 that appeared to depict children -- in 11 days, the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), a nonprofit watchdog, said in late January. In a separate investigation, Britain's data regulator in February launched investigations into Musk's X and xAI over "serious concerns" regarding whether the companies complied with personal data laws when it came to Grok's generation of sexualised deepfakes. In late January, the European Union also hit X with a probe over Grok's generation of sexualised deepfake images of women and minors.