What’s going on: For over a year, French prosecutors have been investigating Elon Musk’s X for fraudulent data extraction — and have since expanded the probe to include the distribution of sexual deepfakes (including child pornography) generated by his AI chatbot Grok. That investigation came to a head yesterday after French police raided the company’s Paris headquarters. Authorities haven’t said what they found, but they issued voluntary summonses for Musk and former X CEO Linda Yaccarino to answer questions in April. While the tech billionaire hasn't commented, X called the raid “an abusive act of law enforcement theater” in a statement. Still, none of this appears to have slowed Musk down.
Tell me more: Earlier this week, Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, announced plans to merge with xAI, the parent company of X. (How many tech companies with the letter “x” does one guy need?) Bloomberg reports that Musk may also be laying the groundwork to take this $1.25 trillion mega-entity public. The bigger question looms: Can any government keep Musk and his X’s in check? Two countries have already banned Grok after it created sexual deepfakes of women and minors. The European Union has also said it supports France’s efforts. However, the Trump administration doesn’t like it when foreign governments try to regulate American tech companies, and it accused France of censorship.
