X’s Paris HQ raided by French prosecutors

Paris prosecutors announced {that a} search was underway at places of work belong to Elon Musk’s X platform as a part of an ongoing investigation first launched in January 2025. The raid is being carried out by Paris and nationwide cybercrime models, with assist from Interpol, in accordance with put up from Paris prosecutors on X. Officers from X have but to touch upon the matter.

On the identical time, Paris prosecutors issued summonses to Elon Musk and Linda Yaccarino for “voluntary interviews” on April 20, 2026 in Paris. The prosecutors additionally introduced they’d now not use X and would solely talk on LinkedIn and Instagram going ahead.

The searches are a part of an investigation that has been ongoing for almost a yr over the functioning of X’s algorithms which might be “prone to have distorted the operation of an automatic knowledge processing system,” investigators said at the time. These modifications reportedly gave higher prominence to sure political content material (particularly from Musk) with out consumer data — one thing that may very well be against the law underneath French legal guidelines.

An investigation was officially launched in July, with Paris prosecutors including a further cost: “Fraudulent extraction of information from an automatic knowledge processing system by an organized group.” Extra just lately, it additionally contains “complicity within the possession of photographs of minors representing a pedo-pornographic character,” resulting from photographs created by Grok between December 25, 2025 and January 1, 2026.

In July, X stated in a press release that the probe “egregiously undermines X’s elementary proper to due course of and threatens our customers’ rights to privateness and free speech. [French officials have] accused X of manipulating its algorithm for ‘international interference’ functions, an allegation which is totally false.”