X offices raided in France/ While the UK opens new investigations into Grok

2026-02-03 15:53:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

The French offices of Elon Musk's X company have been raided by the Paris prosecutor's cybercrime unit as part of an investigation into suspected criminal offenses, including illegal data mining and complicity in the possession of child pornography.

The prosecutor's office also said that both Musk and former X CEO Linda Yaccarino had been subpoenaed to appear at hearings in April.

In a separate development, the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) announced an investigation into Musk's artificial intelligence tool, Grok, over its "potential to produce sexually harmful images and video content."

X has not yet responded to any of the inquiries.

She has previously characterized the French investigation as an attack on freedom of speech. The investigation began in January 2025 when French prosecutors began examining content recommended by X's algorithm, before expanding in July of that year to include Musk's controversial artificial intelligence chatbot, Grok.

In a post at the time, X said the action was "politically motivated" and denied accusations that it had manipulated its algorithm.

Following today's raid, French prosecutors say they are investigating whether X broke the law in multiple areas. Among the possible crimes they said they would investigate were complicity in the possession or organized distribution of child pornography, the violation of people's image rights through sexual deepfakes, and fraudulent data mining by an organized group.

New investigation in the United Kingdom

Meanwhile, UK authorities have given an update on their investigation into sexual deepfakes created by Grok and distributed on X. The images — often made using real images of women without their consent — sparked a barrage of criticism in January from victims, cybersecurity activists and politicians. The company eventually stepped in to prevent the practice, after Ofcom and others launched investigations.

In an update on Tuesday, Ofcom said it was continuing to investigate the platform and was treating it as “an urgent matter”. But it added that it was currently unable to investigate the creation of illegal images by Grok in this case because it did not have sufficient powers in relation to chatbots. However, the ICO said later that it was launching its own investigation, in collaboration with Ofcom, into the processing of personal data in relation to Grok.

“The reports about Grok raise deeply concerning questions about how people’s personal data was used to generate intimate or sexualised images without their knowledge or consent, and whether the necessary safeguards were in place to prevent this,” said William Malcolm, the ICO’s executive director of regulatory risk and innovation.

In late January, the European Commission announced an investigation into its parent company xAI over concerns about the images. A Commission spokesman said it was in contact with France about inspecting X's Paris office.