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Under Elon Musk, Twitter is “taking child exploitation seriously”
Twitter is “taking child exploitation seriously,” the platform’s toughest critic on child sexual exploitation (CSE) told Teslarati in an exclusive interview.
Eliza Bleu is a survivor of human trafficking and an advocate for victims, especially children. Bleu has been putting pressure on Twitter for several years to remove CSE material at scale, and up until Elon Musk’s acquisition, Twitter has been slow to remove most of the content. She told Teslarati that she is happy to see the new changes the platform is implementing under Elon Musk’s new leadership.
She pointed out that under the new leadership, Twitter is “taking child exploitation seriously.” However, there is still much work to be done. There is an ongoing lawsuit against the social media platform that began before Elon Musk purchased it. The plaintiffs, John Doe 1 and John Doe 2 were minors who were sexually exploited, and videos of that exploitation were posted to Twitter. When the two, who are now adults, begged Twitter to remove the content, Twitter refused.
The content that the plaintiffs wanted Twitter to remove had over 167,000 views and 2,223 retweets.
Bleu pointed out a few key changes Twitter has made under its new leadership. The first changes were to its reporting system. In a tweet thread, Bleu made suggestions for Twitter, and so far, the platform has implemented two of those suggestions. The first one is clear and easy reporting. Twitter implemented a two-click reporting for children reporting their own abuse material.
Bleu noted that there needs to be a separate tab for adults experiencing sexual exploitation as well. “It needs to be crystal clear for both adults and children experiencing sexual exploitation, and the reporting options need to be separate.”
Easy Steps Twitter Could Take to Remove Child Sexual Exploitation Material:
1. Clear easy reporting. (Two click reporting for children reporting their own abuse material. Easy enough for a child.)
2. Prioritize the removal of reports of child exploitation first.
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-— 𝔈𝔩𝔦𝔷𝔞 (@elizableu) November 1, 2022
The other key issue that the platform has been noticeably working on is the removal of hashtags known to be used to sell CSE. These are known hashtags that are used for trading CSE on the platform. In the video below, attorneys Lisa Haba and Peter Gentala, the two attorneys representing John Doe 1 and John Doe 2, explain how these tags are used.
These hashtags are mentioned in the lawsuit, and Teslarati investigated them to see if the platform was actually removing the content. We found that Twitter is removing most of the content; however, there are still accounts posting requests for content.
Wow! The most popular hashtag used to sell child sexual abuse material on Twitter is almost completely cleaned out.
— 𝔈𝔩𝔦𝔷𝔞 (@elizableu) November 20, 2022
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The screenshot below shows that Twitter removed content from the “Latest” tabs for one of those top hashtags. The tabs for “Photos” and “Videos” was also empty. However, the “Top Tweets” section still had requests for CSE and used several other tags. Unfortunately, some of those tags are still very active. Bleu noted that the predators will continue to post using a variety of tags, but the tags could help authorities catch the criminals–which is one of the reasons why Teslarati is not publishing the tags.
In her tweet thread, Bleu noted that some of the tags outside of the top three are actively engaging in sharing and posting the illegal content. Bleu told Teslarati that Twitter’s new sense of urgency makes her hopeful.
“After years of advocating for the minor survivors of Twitter, I’ve never been as hopeful as I am right now. I don’t expect perfection from a platform. All I’ve ever wanted was to see a sense of urgency around such a serious matter. In many of these cases, this is a matter of life or death for each victim, so every second matters.”
Bleu’s suggestion for Twitter is to continue prioritizing the removal of the CSE content, go through reports, go over all the backlogs of all the reports, and work hand-in-hand with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. She added that Twitter should innovate around this issue using all the technology that’s available.
“There’s a lot of free technology available that platforms utilize and have had a lot of success,” Bleu added. Her final request for Twitter and Elon Musk is “to tackle this issue at scale without violating innocent citizens’ digital privacy rights.”
Your feedback is welcome. If you have any comments or concerns or see a typo, you can email me at johnna@teslarati.com. You can also reach me on Twitter at @JohnnaCrider1.
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Elon Musk
Tesla’s mysterious Robovan makes a sneak peek with Optimus in Terafab video
Elon Musk shared a new Terafab video showing Optimus, Robovans, and a stunningly futuristic campus.
Elon Musk posted a new video of Terafab on X Thursday morning, and the most eye-catching details in it were not the building itself, but two products still awaiting production: Optimus and the Robovan.
The concept render, credited to SpaceX, shows Optimus robots working the grounds of the roughly 2.5-mile-long facility planned for the Gibbons Creek site in Grimes County, while a Robovan glides along an elevated roadway cutting through the building itself, sharing the frame with a Tesla Semi and a Cybercab.
Robovan is the boxy, driverless people and cargo mover Musk unveiled alongside Cybercab at Tesla’s “We, Robot” event in October 2024. He pitched it as a way to move up to 20 passengers at once, or handle freight instead, at a target cost he claimed could fall under a dollar a mile, with no steering wheel or pedals, the same layout as Cybercab. Nearly two years later, Robovan still has no confirmed production timeline and has not shown up in any factory footage, which makes Thursday’s render one of the only recent looks at the vehicle in any form.
Terafab Texas will be the largest and most valuable building on Earth by far.
And it will be stunningly beautiful. pic.twitter.com/4NweOqTL7y
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 6, 2026
Optimus has moved further along. Tesla began converting Fremont’s old Model S and Model X assembly line into a Gen 3 Optimus production line earlier this year, and Musk visited the site on July 1 to mark the changeover. A second, larger Optimus plant is under construction at Giga Texas, targeting volume production in summer 2027 and eventual capacity of 10 million units a year. Tesla AI lead Ashok Elluswamy said this month the robot has “big shoes to fill” in replacing the S and X line, while Musk has repeatedly called Optimus the company’s biggest product of any kind, with a long-term price he has pegged between $20,000 and $30,000.
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Check out the “Robovan” from @Tesla
📸: @Teslarati pic.twitter.com/D4es2i9NUe
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) October 11, 2024
“Terafab Texas will be the largest and most valuable building on Earth by far,” Musk wrote alongside the clip. “And it will be stunningly beautiful.”
One quote post summed up the reaction: “Futuristic scene with RoboVan + Cybercab + Tesla Semi + Optimus.”
Beyond the vehicles, the architecture wrapped around them stands out too. The building’s facade is canted at sharp angles, with illuminated horizontal bands running through what appears to be a multi level interior visible from outside. Below the elevated roadway, pedestrians walk along a plaza next to a reflecting pool, and the skyline behind the campus is dotted with angular spires that read more like sculpture than infrastructure, a departure from the strictly utilitarian look of Gigafactory Texas or Starbase.
The timing tracks with what Terafab representative Riley Trennell told Grimes County residents on Wednesday, when he said renderings of the facility would be released “within days.” Musk’s post followed less than 24 hours later, and Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s office sent out its own release Thursday confirming the project. As Teslarati reported this morning, Terafab’s tax abatement agreements with Grimes County are now signed and active, and SpaceX has sent the county its first $10 million payment under that deal. The dollar figure tied to this phase of construction, per Reuters, is $16.8 billion, one of the first hard capital expenditure numbers attached to Terafab since Musk unveiled the joint Tesla-SpaceX-xAI venture in March.Reaction on X ranged from enthusiastic to skeptical. “God Bless Texas! Everything is bigger and better in Texas!” one reply read. Another was more measured: “Terafab in a decade…..”
Whether the finished building matches the render is a separate question from whether Musk wanted people talking about the render itself. Less than a day after posting, the video had already crossed 5.5 million views.
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Cybertruck
Tesla Cybertruck production snaps back after ugly supplier fight
Cybertrucks are piling up again at Giga Texas after Tesla’s court win against a parts supplier.
Cybertruck production at Giga Texas is showing its first visible recovery since Tesla sued a supplier last month over withheld manufacturing tooling.
Aerial observer Joe Tegtmeyer flew over the Austin factory Wednesday morning and counted roughly 100 or more Cybertrucks filling the outbound lot, a sharp jump from the thin numbers seen in recent weeks. The flyover came a day after a judge granted Tesla a temporary restraining order against Angstrom Automotive Group, the parts supplier at the center of the dispute.
Tesla filed an emergency lawsuit in late July after Angstrom told the automaker it planned to close the Troy, Texas facility where Tesla’s die-cast tools, trim dies and other Cybertruck stamping equipment were housed. According to Tesla’s complaint, a shipment of 700 finished parts never left the building, and when Tesla sent representatives to retrieve its equipment, accompanied by law enforcement, they were turned away. Angstrom allegedly then asked for an extra $250,000 a week to keep operating, which Tesla’s filing described as holding its own property for ransom.
TESLA: U.S. District Judge Christopher R. Wolfe of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, Waco Division granted Tesla a Temporary Restraining Order and Writ of Replevin in its dispute with Angstrom Automotive (Case No. 6:26-cv-00477).
The order authorizes… https://t.co/E1DKcQSxMn pic.twitter.com/LR8aAiV2Og
— S.E. Robinson, Jr. (@SERobinsonJr) August 5, 2026
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The restraining order gives Tesla immediate right of entry to Angstrom’s facility to recover the tooling. It is temporary, with a fuller hearing still to come, but the speed of Wednesday’s rebound suggests the Angstrom shortage was indeed the main bottleneck limiting Cybertruck output. Outbound lot counts are an imperfect measure of actual production, since finished trucks can sit for days before shipping, but a lot that full after a lean stretch is a meaningful signal.
Cybertruck output at Giga Texas has fluctuated all year as Tesla worked through supply issues and introduced new trims, including a cheaper Dual Motor AWD version that drew strong early demand.
Elon Musk
Space finally faced the people living next to its next Terafab mega-project
SpaceX confirmed Terafab’s Grimes County site is locked in, with construction starting within months.
SpaceX and Terafab representatives sat across from Grimes County residents for the first time on Wednesday, telling a packed Commissioners Court room that the $55 billion chip manufacturing project is now a done deal at the Gibbons Creek Reservoir site.
The meeting followed a $10 million check SpaceX sent the county earlier this week, satisfying a payment deadline built into the tax abatement agreement both sides signed in June. Elon Musk shared a post on X confirming the payment, and County Judge Joe Fauth told the San Antonio Express-News his office deposited the check after it beat its deadline.
Wednesday’s session, first reported by KBTX, moved the project from paperwork to construction. Terafab representative Riley Trennell told residents the JETI tax break agreements with Iola ISD and Anderson-Shiro CISD are signed and active, and that civil work and foundation prep are starting almost immediately. Renderings of the facility could be released within days, he said, with construction beginning within months.
The foundations for an exciting future are being built in Texas. Next up: Terafab → https://t.co/jGg52Zhn5I pic.twitter.com/SNfSXNr2tb
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 6, 2026
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
Musk first announced Terafab in March as a joint venture between Tesla, SpaceX and xAI aimed at producing over a terawatt of AI compute annually, an amount that dwarfs the roughly 20 gigawatts the entire global chip industry produces today. Intel joined as a manufacturing partner in April. Musk has said the project needed its own day in the spotlight rather than being squeezed into an earnings call, and for months the Grimes County site remained unconfirmed even as reporting pointed there.
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SpaceX attorney Buck Brannon used Wednesday’s meeting to note that the company’s abatement is roughly 78 percent, not the 100 percent some earlier reports suggested. In exchange, SpaceX will pay Grimes County a fixed $20 million a year for 35 years, a total of $710 million, which Brannon said exceeds the $14 million Tesla paid Travis County in 2025.
SpaceX also addressed environmental concerns that have followed the project since Musk’s Terafab partnership with Intel was announced. Representatives said Terafab will not raise electric bills for other ratepayers, will not deplete local water supplies and will not draw down the Navasota River. SpaceX confirmed it owns the Navasota River pumping station, which it plans to use to divert stormwater into the Gibbons Creek Reservoir, and said it will build its own natural gas plants to power the facility rather than pulling from the ERCOT grid.
Grimes County commissioners also approved an addendum letting county employees use ten approved AI chatbots for work, including Grok.
Tesla’s mysterious Robovan makes a sneak peek with Optimus in Terafab video
Tesla Cybertruck production snaps back after ugly supplier fight
