Elon Musk Suspends Twitter Accounts That Follow Millionaires’ Private Jets, Including The One That Tracked His

Elon Musk has had enough of being followed. Twitter yesterday suspended at least 25 accounts that followed in real time the location of private jets of millionaires and public bodies. Among those profiles is @ElonJet, which since 2020 has been tracking the movements of his private plane. The decision conflicts with what he said just a month ago, shortly after buying the social network for 44,000 million dollars: “My respect for freedom of expression includes not banning even the account that follows my plane,” he tweeted. on November 7.

Account @ElonJet He had half a million followers and was nourished by public information related to the takeoffs and landings of the Twitter owner’s aircraft, as well as an estimate of the CO₂ emissions emitted by each flight. This has been confirmed by his creator, Jack Sweeney, a 20-year-old student who has promised to continue his work on other social networks. Musk had long known of the existence of that account. He went so far as to offer Sweeney $5,000 to close the account. The young man rejected the offer.

Twitter has also suspended similar accounts that followed the jets of other magnates such as Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta; Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon; the investor Warren Buffett or Donald Trump, former president of the United States. The influencer Kim Kardashian and the singer Taylor Swift, among others, should not fear for their privacy when they get on board their private planes. The same goes for various Russian oligarchs who Sweeney also had under his radar.

Musk has justified his move as a security issue. Sharing people’s real-time location can put them in danger, says the South African-born tycoon. The same does not happen, in his opinion, if what is shared are the past locations of someone. Twitter’s terms and conditions have been changed to include the term [compartir la] “real-time location”, which did not appear until last week, among the assumptions that justify the closure of an account.

The founder of Tesla and SpaceX has published, perhaps as an additional explanation, that his family has been harassed on the street. “Last night, the car that little X was in [su hijo se llama X AE A-XII] in Los Angeles he was followed by a crazy stalker (thought to be me), who then blocked the path of the car and climbed on the roof. Legal action is being taken against Sweeney and organizations that support harm to my family, ”he tweeted, also offering a video showing the alleged harasser.

Twitter’s content moderation policy has gone through several ups and downs since Musk took over the reins of the social network. At first, he said that he would create a council to decide which accounts could or could not be on his Twitter, although he later dismissed the idea. He also reinstated Donald Trump, who was expelled from the platform after the assault on the Capitol.

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