X marks the raid: French cops swoop on Musk's Paris ops

French police raided Elon Musk's X offices in Paris this morning as part of a criminal investigation into alleged algorithmic manipulation by foreign powers. The Paris prosecutor's office (Parquet de Paris) announced [PDF] the action on Tuesday. The investigation, which began in January 2025, stems from two complaints - one …

[Mike 125]

You gotta love the French- they just don't give a shit. I wanna move there NOW.

[heyrick]

They have invited Musk to turn up to answer some questions.

I can't help but think they're secretly hoping that the reply will be a poop emoji or some mindless blathering about freedom of speech...

[Tron]

Maybe not.

I'm guessing you aren't French, so that makes you a foreigner, and nobody wants foreigners to move to their country any more. You may be an agent of a foreign power or an economic migrant, and your presence may dilute the Frenchness of France. Like it or not, you would be as foreign as Musk and consequently about as welcome.

Always amused when Brexit supporters hit roadblocks when they try to retire to Spain. These things work both ways.

[seven of five]

Re: Maybe not.

> hit roadblocks when they try to retire to Spain

Or Malta.

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Maybe not.

If you hit Malta when trying to retire to Spain then something has gone wrong with your satnav.

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: Maybe not.

something has gone wrong with your satnav.

That would be Vlad getting up to mischief

[MachDiamond]

Re: Maybe not.

"and nobody wants foreigners to move to their country any more."

I'm more than happy to see people wanting to move to the US with the thought of becoming an American citizen and integrating into the tradition and culture of the nation. It's helpful if they have useful skills somewhat above digging ditches (we grow those in-house by the thousands) and won't be relying on government largess to survive. Becoming fluent in English (American) is something else that I'd be looking for.

What's the point in moving to a new country and dragging in your old country that one would assume had flaws you are trying to distance yourself from?

[Aladdin Sane]

Re: Maybe not.

Immigrating en masse, bringing your own tradition and culture with you and not integrating is very much American tradition.

[MachDiamond]

Re: Maybe not.

"Immigrating en masse, bringing your own tradition and culture with you and not integrating is very much American tradition."

Sigh, and so is eschewing all of the forms and permissions as well.

[Ganso]

Re: Maybe not.

And you might need to learn a new language, arabic, I am guessing.

[chivo243]

Don't do it, the missus says it's gone to hell in a hand basket since we left a few years ago. It wasn't so good then.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for the French!

Someone holding Elmo to account?

How long until "WaR aGaInSt FrEe SpEeCh!!!" arguments?

How long until a 5000000% tariff on French goods because they are picking on a poor little US business?

How long until Xitter just goes away?

[BartyFartsLast]

Re: Thanks for the French!

Pavel Durov ofnttat well known moderate service Telegram, has already come out saying France isn't a free country.

Twitter has ignored requests for comment, not even a poop emoji, which is surprising because they must be replete with those

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: Thanks for the French!

Twitter has ignored requests for comment, not even a poop emoji, which is surprising because they must be replete with those

They're currently needed for the Donald's (tame) press conferences.

[MiguelC]

Re: "Pavel Durov ofnttat well known moderate service Telegram, has already come out saying France isn't a free country."

Well, he would say that, wouldn't he, considering he was arrested in Paris, after being indicted on twelve charges, including complicity in the distribution of child exploitation material and drug trafficking.

[BartyFartsLast]

Strange how none of the "usual suspects" are up in arms about that, just like none of them are frothing and whining about the Epstein files

[CaNsA]

Oh Xit!

[IGotOut]

Sigh..

"Parquet de Paris also confirmed it will close its social media account on X, and anyone wishing to follow its updates can do so instead via LinkedIn or Instagram."

Sigh......how about something not requiring a data harvesting account with a US megacorp?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Sigh..

You've spotted a Parquet flaw!

[Uncle Slacky]

Re: Sigh..

It's not nice to fool Mother Nature!

[chivo243]

Re: Sigh..

+1 Butter! You must be near 60 to know that reference! ->

[Uncle Slacky]

Re: Sigh..

Getting there! (see icon)

[that one in the corner]

Re: Sigh..

Not knowing the reference, I looked it up - ah, right age, wrong locale.

Definitely wrong locale, as sharing the phrase "Chiffon Soft Stick Margarine" is not provoking the sort of reaction I presume its creators intended (e.g. "well, if it only sticks softly to my clothing that might be a good selling point, but aren't there more important attributes for a margarine?")

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Sigh..

ROFL

[Ken Shabby]

Re: Sigh..

Please forgive my schoolboy French (I think I got a C at O level), but maybe that should be

“se rouler par terre de rire”

[heyrick]

Re: Sigh..

"how about something not requiring a data harvesting account with a US megacorp?"

Such as?

(aside from the obvious "why isn't this on your website" question)

[retiredFool]

Re: Sigh..

I've said essentially this for awhile. If someone wants to follow a gov org, they should do so on the gov org direct website. Twatter was very good at getting gov org's to disseminate info via twatter making it the defacto source of info. Which is what musk really purchased. So kudos to this org for walking from twatter. Now if we could just get the thousands of others to do so as well.

[VoiceOfTruth]

Re: Sigh..

It's a big problem - the centralisation of the internet. The days of the myriad small web sites are in the past. Sure, they still exist. But the mega-hosters are where most eyeballs are now.

There is no reason why anyone who wanted to follow what Parquet de Paris is doing could not go to their web site. But it's another bookmark, another click away. For some reason somebody at Parquet de Paris thinks it is easier and more convenient to update a page on LinkedIn rather than update a self-hosted page.

[katrinab]

Re: Sigh..

Mastodon?

[richardcox13]

Re: Sigh..

Beat me to it.

European development, no mega-corp (USAian or otherwise) and you can run your own server!

[Dan 55]

Re: Sigh..

Or RSS.

I wonder why the RSS button disappeared from social networks and the software written by big US corporations in the early-mid 2010s.

[MachDiamond]

Re: Sigh..

"I wonder why the RSS button disappeared from social networks and the software written by big US corporations in the early-mid 2010s."

I really hate "push" services. I wind up with all sorts of crap I have no interest in that takes ages to parse. The S/N was a big reason I chucked Twitter ages ago. It was neat in the beginning when I could get a reply from Eric Idle or Steve Martin, but there became too much slop and it had to go as I started seeing my time going down the xitter.

[that one in the corner]

Re: Sigh..

> I really hate "push" services

Ditto.

All the more reason for us to wish for the return of RSS and the ability to look down the list of titles for today and pick'n'choose which one(s) to follow up, instead of doom-scrolling the entire posts.

And without the RSS feeds picking up and following podcasts has become a right PITA IMO. Grump, grump; where I like to find my podcasts is waiting in the correct directory on my hard drive, thank you very much.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Sigh..

It was downhill all the way once the Post Office started pushing letters through your door every single f'ing day.

[Khaptain]

Re: Sigh..

I can only presume that Telegram no longer wishes for the Govt to be any part of their service.

The French cancelled Rumble , now it's back. They can cancel Twitter but I am sure that it wont be long before they are back too.

[MachDiamond]

Re: Sigh..

"Sigh......how about something not requiring a data harvesting account with a US megacorp?"

Hmmm, something like an official government website that's updated regularly? How novel.

[DS999]

Re: Sigh..

France needs to use something open source like Mastadon to create a French government site that their agencies can use.

Or someone in the EU needs to create a social media site that obeys EU laws that EU countries can use instead of ones run by US companies.

Right now neither exists so getting off X into the arms of Meta and Microsoft is their only real choice.

[Anonymous Coward]

Enough of this charade ..

Enough of this charade. It's patently obvious these coordinated attacks on Twitter are a politically driven assault on free speech. It is curious that no other social media has been subject to such onerous investigations. But then again, the Feds did sit down once a week with Twitter and Facebook to decide who was going to be banned and give them access to people's direct messages.

[katrinab]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

That's because no other social media actively facilitiates the production of child sex abuse material

[BasicReality]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

Neither does X, but when does the truth matter to people like you?

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

Have you considered upgrading to one of the premium versions of reality, rather than the basic one that is littered with targeted propaganda?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

You've clearly not heard about the cesspit called Bluesky.

Where all the 'good people' hang out now.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

You do know you could use a handle that doesn't identify you, rather than always posting AC, don't you, Elon?

For example, in real life, I am neither elongated, nor a muskrat. Believe it or not, I'm not even a rodent of any sort!

[MachDiamond]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

"Believe it or not, I'm not even a rodent of any sort!"

I'm speechless. You could have said a long time ago.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: Enough of this charade ..

I like to maintain an air of mystique; a heady musk if you will.

[Jamie Jones]

So predicable

As I was reading this, I thought "I bet Musk will say something about how this is woke anti-free speech".

Then I read this: "In a July statement, X described the French probe as an attack on free speech that distorted domestic law to "serve a political agenda."#

Ha! Free speech only applies to right-wingers, don't you know?

Musk bans people who post things he doesn't agree with, Elisons tik-tok bans accounts or removes posts against those critical of Israels genocide or ICE murders, and Trump has arrested people for doing similar, or for daring to film ICE.

But of course, if you get investigated for encouraging a low-IQ mob to attack and burn immigrants, then according to JD Vance and Musk, you're the victim.

P.S. Anyone who downvotes this post without attempting to refute it is just a fascist trump cuck moron. History will remember you as "Mitläufer". There, I said it.

[heyrick]

Re: So predicable

"History will remember you as "Mitläufer"."

Don't make me laugh. There's so much shit flowing on the internet, and so many ill informed "opinions", that unless you're somebody who matters (or at the very least, somebody who other people think matters), history won't remember you at all. In a hundred years you'll be a name on a grave that nobody visits. Me too. Most of us, in fact.

[Neil Barnes]

Re: So predicable

Not me.

(a) I'm not going to last anything like a hundred years, so I'll be well dead

(b) Cremation.

[Jamie Jones]

Re: So predicable

I meant collectively.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: So predicable

Time to change your Nappy me thinks !

[Tron]

quote: algorithmic manipulation by foreign powers.

Just how insecure are the French about their culture and identity that they worry about this?

[Brave Coward]

Re: quote: algorithmic manipulation by foreign powers.

Quite a lot. They have been heavily exposed to us-ian propaganda for eighty years, and now they feel a little bit tired.

[heyrick]

Re: quote: algorithmic manipulation by foreign powers.

Well, given that a lot of political parties and organisations use the dead blue bird, a very real manipulation could be to bury stuff posted by liberal parties and promote that by right wing parties [*], which is directly meddling with the democracy of a sovereign country (and of course next to impossible to actually prove).

* - Do note that this is now an actual stated part of the United States foreign policy. Yes, they were dumb enough to put the bit that's supposed to remain unsaid in writing...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: quote: algorithmic manipulation by foreign powers.

It's all about preventing the rise of another wave of extreme right wing fascism in Europe. It took a terrible toll on human lives and general wellbeing the last time around. Nobody in their right mind wants a repeat of that.

And yet, for the most moronic of reasons known only to them, imbeciles like JD Vance and Elon Musk have been promoting the return of this terror to European soil. It is foreign interference at its worst, equivalent in many ways to rectum Putin's extensive pathetic propaganda efforts in the exact same direction. This type of activity is why RT America (Russia Today) was ordered to register as a foreign agent with the US DoJ in 2017, why Sputnik and RT were fined in the EU in 2022, and why RT France was banned from broadcasting in France in 2023. If X and xAI want to play similar games, they can expect the very same consideration.

And what's next Vance, Musk, and chihuahuas, reversing the DoJ's decision on RT America because свобода слова? Don't make me laugh!

[werdsmith]

I enjoyed the first news announcement this morning:

“The French cybercrime unit is conducting a search at the Paris offices of social media network X, according to a post by the Paris prosecutor’s office on X.”

[retiredFool]

Saw this too, "Musk and former CEO Linda Yaccarino were summoned to a hearing on April 20. Other X staff were also summoned as witnesses." and later it says "After such a hearing, authorities can decide to either shelve or continue the probe, and potentially put suspects in custody." Fingers crossed. Imagine the kerfuffle if Musk was arrested and held in custody in France. Fingers and toes crossed.

[JimmyPage]

Hang on, what happened to the paperless office (© 1980) ????

I am mildly amused at either of the two conclusions from this story.

The first is that the French authorities believe there is something on French soil that can be seized.

The second is that one of the supposedly most advanced tech companies on the planet still uses hard copies that can be seized.

[IGotOut]

Re: Hang on, what happened to the paperless office (© 1980) ????

Not very bright are you!

[Excused Boots]

Re: Hang on, what happened to the paperless office (© 1980) ????

"The second is that one of the supposedly most advanced tech companies on the planet still uses hard copies that can be seized.”

Oh I promise you that you would be surprised, and you think that ‘X’, is a really advanced tech company?

[Not Yb]

Re: Hang on, what happened to the paperless office (© 1980) ????

"You can't take hard copies we don't have!"

*Siezes computers and servers instead.*

"No, wait..."

Also, there's no such thing as the Paperless Office. It's a marketing pipe dream.

[MachDiamond]

Re: Hang on, what happened to the paperless office (© 1980) ????

"Also, there's no such thing as the Paperless Office. It's a marketing pipe dream."

I've always printed and filed reports from my accounting system. If the computer isn't on and the accounting software running, I can often look up something much more quickly on treeware. There was a time when I wasn't diligent in backing things up and had a hard drive fail. It was a slog to re-enter everything from paper files, but I did it to the loss of a whole week of not being able to do much else.

There's also the bonus of PaperOS™ being the same for many decades now so no version issues and whether there's still a computer around to run it.

[Mr Dogshit]

LOL

Things not going too well for Muskrat. China has just outlawed his stupid car door handles.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: LOL

...and it turns out (allegedly) that he couldn't even manage to get himself a party invite to Paedo island, because he was too cringe for the convicted child rapist who was happy to invite the Andrew formerly known as Prince and Mr "grab 'em by the pussy" along.

[MachDiamond]

Re: LOL

"Things not going too well for Muskrat. China has just outlawed his stupid car door handles."

That and xAI needing to be bailed out by SpaceX which might not be on that stable of ground itself.

I'll be right here with a bucket of popcorn and a Guinness when the whole thing catches fire, falls over and sinks into a swamp.

[Tim99]

Re: LOL

"when the whole thing catches fire, falls over and sinks into a swamp". Then nuke it from orbit, just to be really sure?

[MachDiamond]

Re: LOL

"Then nuke it from orbit, just to be really sure?"

I'd be nice and just drop a rock on them. Granted, it would be a rather large rock. Nickel-Iron.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: LOL

> China has just outlawed his stupid car door handles.

The CNN article China to ban hidden car door handles made popular by Tesla in world first reports that the ban (which is applied to all manufacturers, even local to China, not just Tesla) was prompted after deaths and serious injuries were attributable to this idiocy. Good for China.

Noticeable in that article:

> Xiaomi saw its stock value tumble last year after a fatal crash involving its sedan killed three people in March – with local media and government-affiliated outlets reporting there had been issues unlocking the car door.

Whilst

> Last September, Tesla said it was looking into redesigning the way to open its car doors in an emergency, after several accidents where passengers were reportedly killed or severely injured in burning vehicles because rescuers could not open them... An investigation by Bloomberg found 140 incidents of people being trapped in their Teslas due to problems with the door handles, including several that resulted in horrific injuries.

So one death for Xiaomi leads to stock values tumbling whilst Tesla gets away with "looking into" the issue.

Ah, America; why let a few deaths or mutilations get in the way of your stock value?

[BasicReality]

The UK shows themselves pretty incompetent quite often. The French just said "hold my beer."

[MachDiamond]

"The French just said "hold my beer.""

??

Wouldn't that be "Hold my wine" ?

I can't think of a French beer I'd buy with my own money.

[Winkypop]

American exceptionalism writ large

Go France!

Battre le fer pendant qu’il est chaud!

[Groo The Wanderer - A Canuck]

You can tell when Musk is guilty: he responds with his favourite catch phrase "Freedom of Speech."

A) This isn't America. It's France. Your laws don't apply.

B) You've BRAGGED about supporting and propping up the most obnoxious of right wing parties, like the good little Fascist you are...

[naive]

Your upvotes imply this reply will get a tenfold of down votes, but lets give it a shot anyway.

Musk X platform is the *only* large scale platform allowing free speech, condemning the X platform based on what people write in it is like saying firearms are bad, because those are also abused for bad purposes. It doesn't imply free, uncensored, speech is bad.

The constant warfare against Musk points at a large coalition behind this, these are composed of corrupted politicians and the rest of US Big-Tech, for whom Musk is a thorn in their side, since he knows what they are building in their mega data centers.

Musk made the bad financial decision to buy twitter for too much money to provide humanity with a free and uncensored voice when it is needed, and that might be sooner than most think.

Musk is the last man standing between the 1%-ers and humanity once they get their hands on god-like AGI, the 1%-ers plan not to use this AGI to benefit humanity as a whole, but for them selves, turning the majority of humanity into undesired entropy in their equation.

[that one in the corner]

> Musk is the last man standing between the 1%-ers and humanity

Bwa-hahaha!

You really can not be serious!

Musk is the 1% of the 1% of the 1%... he is as divorced from the bulk of humanity as it is possible to be.

> Musk made the bad financial decision to buy twitter for too much money

Because he cocked up! This is all in the public record, in his own words as he tried to back out of the deal.

"naive"

You have the most singularly appropriate username, congratulations on that.

[collinsl]

Musk X platform is the *only* large scale platform allowing free speech

Unless you hurt Elon's feelings or say something nasty about Trump or try and talk about ICE or try and track celebrity's jets or...

X is just like the other social platforms, it's moderated based on the whims of the owning company. Yes they claim to have rules and obey laws, but ultimately they decide what appears or doesn't appear on their platform. They use convenient excuses like "free speech" or "hate crime" or "stalking" to justify their decisions about removal of content.

Yes, some content should not be allowed on platforms at all, but 100% that is being used as an excuse to remove other non-illegal content which the company owners or their backers/friends object to. Especially Elon, who seems to have a very thin skin.

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be a dubious thing to say in America, too. Many people there don't understand what the first amendment actually means.

[Anonymous Coward]

Mom, why is that guy holding his right arm up at an angle?

A true free speech patriot son, one of the people.

(Taken from: A guide to your nearest alternative universe. RightWingPress 2024)