French offices of X raided as part of investigation into child porn, deepfakes, officials say
Indonesia and Malaysia moved to temporarily ban Grok, the AI chatbot on the social media platform X, the first two countries in the world to do so in response to its image generation feature. Indonesia released *** statement on Saturday which read, quote, The government views nonconsensual sexual deep fake practices as *** serious violation of human rights, human dignity, and the security of citizens in the digital space. Now Malaysia followed *** day later, saying on Sunday. This action follows repeated misuse of grok to generate obscene, sexually explicit, indecent, grossly offensive, and nonconsensual manipulated images, including content involving women and minors, despite prior regulatory engagement and formal notices issued to XCorp and XAI LLC. Now these two countries do have *** track record of blocking or restricting tech and online platforms over obscene. Content, but we also know that officials in the UK, EU, India, and the US have raised alarm over Grok’s ability to generate nonconsensual and sexualized images of women and minors, which is *** practice often referred to as digital undressing, which can, as you can imagine, be deeply humiliating for victims as it’s very difficult to remove these images from online platforms. Now Elon Musk, the CEO of the parent company of both X and Grok, Hasn’t directly responded to this crackdown, but he has earlier criticized the UK government over *** potential ban of X, saying quote, they just want to suppress free speech. Now, in response to the growing alarm of the sexually explicit deep fakes, X has moved the AI image generation function of Grok behind *** paywall, but this is very much *** developing story as Grok still hasn’t come up with an effective solution to limit the spread of this content. Hannika Montgomery, CNN, Hong Kong.
The Paris prosecutors’ office said a search was underway Tuesday at the French offices of Elon Musk’s social media platform X as part of a preliminary investigation into a range of alleged offenses, including spreading child pornography and deepfakes.The investigation was opened in January last year by the prosecutors’ cybercrime unit, the statement said. It is looking into alleged “complicity” in detaining 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, and other offenses.In addition, prosecutors filed a request for “voluntary interviews” of Elon Musk and Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X from 2023 to 2025, scheduled for April 20. X employees have also been summoned that same week in April to be heard as witnesses, the statement said.A spokesperson for X did not respond immediately to a request for comment.In a message posted on X, the Paris prosecutors’ office confirmed the ongoing searches and said it was leaving the platform while calling on followers to join on other social media.“At this stage, the conduct of the investigation is based on a constructive approach, with the aim of ultimately ensuring that the X platform complies with French law, as it operates on the national territory,” prosecutors said in a statement.The investigation was first opened following reports by a French lawmaker alleging that biased algorithms on X were likely to have distorted the functioning of an automated data processing system. It was later expanded following additional reports that X’s artificial intelligence chatbot Grok allegedly denied Holocaust and spread sexually explicit deepfakes, the statement said.
The Paris prosecutors’ office said a search was underway Tuesday at the French offices of Elon Musk’s social media platform X as part of a preliminary investigation into a range of alleged offenses, including spreading child pornography and deepfakes.
The investigation was opened in January last year by the prosecutors’ cybercrime unit, the statement said. It is looking into alleged “complicity” in detaining 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, and other offenses.
In addition, prosecutors filed a request for “voluntary interviews” of Elon Musk and Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X from 2023 to 2025, scheduled for April 20. X employees have also been summoned that same week in April to be heard as witnesses, the statement said.
A spokesperson for X did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
In a message posted on X, the Paris prosecutors’ office confirmed the ongoing searches and said it was leaving the platform while calling on followers to join on other social media.
“At this stage, the conduct of the investigation is based on a constructive approach, with the aim of ultimately ensuring that the X platform complies with French law, as it operates on the national territory,” prosecutors said in a statement.
The investigation was first opened following reports by a French lawmaker alleging that biased algorithms on X were likely to have distorted the functioning of an automated data processing system. It was later expanded following additional reports that X’s artificial intelligence chatbot Grok allegedly denied Holocaust and spread sexually explicit deepfakes, the statement said.
