Paris – Elon Musk was summoned to Paris on Monday, where investigators are looking into allegations of misconduct related to social media platform X, including the dissemination of child sexual abuse material and “deepfake” content.
The richest man in the world and Linda Yaccarino – former CEO of
It is not yet clear 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 respond to a request sent to the press email.
French prosecutors also suspect that the controversy surrounding deepfakes of the platform’s Grok AI system was concocted to boost the value of companies owned by Musk ahead of a key market listing, and have alerted US authorities. Musk welcomed the report that American justice officials refused to help French investigators, posting on X: “This has to stop.”
The reason for summoning Musk
Musk was summoned following a search carried out 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 capacity as directors of X at the time of the events investigated. Yaccarino was CEO from May 2023 to July 2025.
“These voluntary interviews with 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 legislation, to the extent that it operates on national territory.”
The Paris prosecutor’s office said that the possible non-appearance of Musk and Yaccarino on Monday “is not an obstacle for the investigations to continue.”
What is being investigated
French authorities opened their investigation following reports from a French lawmaker who alleged that X’s biased algorithms likely distorted the functioning of an automated data processing system. It was expanded after the AI system, Grok, generated posts that allegedly denied the Holocaust, a crime in France, and spread sexually explicit deepfakes.
The alleged “complicity” in the possession and dissemination of pornographic images of minors, deepfakes with explicit sexual content, denial of crimes against humanity and manipulation of an automated data processing system as part of an organized group, among other charges, are being investigated.
Grok, created by xAI and available through
Grok also wrote in a widely shared post in French that the gas chambers at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp were designed for “disinfection with Zyklon B against typhus” and not for mass murder, language long associated with Holocaust denial.
In subsequent messages on
French prosecutors alert US authorities
In March, the Paris prosecutor’s office alerted the US Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) – the US federal agency responsible for regulating and supervising financial markets – suggesting “that the controversy surrounding deepfakes of sexual content generated by Grok could have been deliberately orchestrated to artificially increase the value of companies X and xAI, which could constitute a crime,” prosecutors said.
The Paris prosecutor’s office said this could have been done “before the planned June 2026 IPO of the new entity formed by the merger of Space X and xAI, at a time when company X was clearly losing momentum.”
The Department of Justice ignores the French call
According to the Wall Street Journal, the Justice Department told French law enforcement authorities that it would not 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 judicial system to interfere in an American business.
The letter also said that France’s requests for assistance to the United States “constitute an effort to entangle the United States in a politically charged criminal proceeding aimed at unfairly regulating through prosecution the commercial activities of a social media platform.”
French judicial authorities did not respond to requests for comment.
Open investigations on various internet platforms
The cybercrime unit of the Paris Prosecutor’s Office has launched a series of investigations in recent years focused on the alleged illegal activities of Internet platforms.
The French-speaking website Coco, cited in the historic trial that turned Gisèle Pelicot into a global icon against sexual violence, closed in 2024 when its director was accused of complicity in the dissemination of child pornography and trafficking of minors for sexual purposes, among other crimes.
Pavel Durov, founder of the Telegram messaging app, was charged with preliminary charges and placed under judicial supervision for allegedly allowing criminal activities on the platform, including child sexual abuse material and drug trafficking.
The Paris prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into TikTok last year over accusations that the platform allows content that promotes suicide and that its algorithms can encourage vulnerable young people to take their own lives.
For its part, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has filed a new complaint against X with the cybercrime unit of the Paris prosecutor’s office, for “the platform’s policies, which allow disinformation to flourish.”
This story was translated from English to Spanish with an artificial intelligence tool and was reviewed by an editor before publication.