Twitter has suspended accounts that track the locations of private jets, including one that tracked CEO Elon Musk’s plane.
In response to a user on Wednesday Hey Misk He said The accounts violated Twitter’s “doxxing” rules, which means they disclosed non-public personal information.
@elonjet’s account, which has amassed more than half a million followers, was suspended Wednesday morning for violating unspecified Twitter rules. Later in the day, Twitter accounts tracking the planes of Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos were also suspended.
The Musk-tracking account was created by 20-year-old Jack Sweeney, a college student in Florida. Sweeney’s personal Twitter account was also suspended on Wednesday.
Sweeney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“Well, looks like @ElonJet is on hold,” Sweeney tweeted earlier Wednesday, before commenting.
Last month, Musk said he would allow the ElonJet account to continue even at risks to his personal safety.
Other social media accounts Sweeney set up to track Musk’s plane, including those on Instagram and Telegram, are still active.
The specialized receivers are able to track the ICAO address of the aircraft when the aircraft is in flight. A community of users of these aircraft tracking receivers has been formed around the world.
Sweeney told CNBC he started the Twitter account in June 2020 because he was a fan of Musk’s work at the business mogul’s Tesla and SpaceX.
“So far, my dream car is definitely a Tesla,” Sweeney said.
He also told CNBC that Musk previously offered to pay him $5,000 to cancel the account because it was a safety risk.
“Ultimately, the last message from him was, ‘It’s not right to take this out,'” Sweeney said.
Although Musk has professed his commitment to freedom of expression since acquiring Twitter for $44 billion in October, Including returning accounts associated with the Q-anon movement and other far-right accounts. internally however, He removed the critics to his policies from the company.
“Devoted student. Bacon advocate. Beer scholar. Troublemaker. Falls down a lot. Typical coffee enthusiast.”