PARIS, Feb 7 (Reuters) - French prosecutors said on

Friday they have opened an investigation into Elon Musk's X

social media platform over alleged algorithmic bias.

News of the probe comes just days before a major AI summit

in Paris, which is due to host global leaders including U.S.

Vice President JD Vance and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi,

as well as Alphabet and Microsoft ( MSFT ) executives.

The Paris prosecutor's office said it launched the

investigation after being contacted on January 12 by a lawmaker

alleging that biased algorithms in X were likely to have

distorted the operation of an automated data processing system.

X, formerly known as Twitter, did not respond to a request

for comment.

The investigation underlines growing global wariness over

the power of X, the name given to Twitter by tech billionaire

Musk after he bought the social media network.

Musk has used X to personally support right-wing parties and

causes in countries including Germany and Britain, leading to

concerns about undue foreign interference.

French centrist lawmaker Eric Bothorel, posting on X, said

he had written to the J3 cybercrime unit of the Paris

prosecutors' office with his concerns that X was using biased

algorithms, a report by Franceinfo said.

"Prosecutors and specialised assistants from the cybercrime

unit are analysing it and carrying out initial technical

checks," the Paris public prosecutor's office said in an email

to Reuters.

"I sent a letter to the cyber J3 prosecutor's office on this

subject on January 12," Bothorel wrote on X.

The J3 unit of the Paris prosecutors' office led last year's

probe of Telegram boss Pavel Durov, who was arrested after

landing at a Paris airport. Durov, who is out on bail, denies

the allegations, but Telegram has since said it is cooperating

more closely with police to remove illegal content.

The J3 unit has shown a willingness to use novel and

aggressive laws to target the owners of major platforms.

X was blocked for over a month in Brazil last year for

failing to stop the spread of misinformation, before eventually

complying with a Supreme Court order that allowed for the

network to be reestablished.