Twitter users can once more find out where Elon Musk is flying thanks to his private jet’s resumption of tracking. Days earlier, Elon Musk had ordered the account @ElonJet to be banned from Twitter. Because it was live-tracking his private plane using information that was available to the public. Musk also announced that accounts that shared users’ real-time locations would be prohibited since they were doing users. Elon Musk’s account is being followed on Twitter once more, but with a 24-hour delay.
The 24 hours here are crucial. The owner of Twitter
Elon Musk stated that it would be acceptable if the information on a private plane were disclosed with a slight delay when defending the ban on ElonJet. He said that the real-time information was the issue. Therefore, the previous Twitter bot following Musk’s jet was constructed by student and techie Jack Sweeney, who now includes a 24-hour lag. The new account is known as @ElonJetNextDay.
Despite Musk’s prior declaration that he would not ban ElonJet after purchasing Twitter, ElonJet and Sweeney’s accounts were suspended. “Any account that doxxes someone’s current location will be suspended because it violates their physical safety. This includes links to websites that provide real-time location data, “Musk posted in a tweet. “Legal action is being initiated against Sweeney and the groups that encouraged violence to my family,” the statement reads.
With the username @ElonJetNextDay, Sweeney started a new Twitter account with the name “ElonJet but delayed” a week after the suspension. And according to the account’s description, Sweeney won’t manually upload information for this account after 24 hours rather than posting real-time updates of Musk’s flight. Over 17,100 people have already followed the account.
The new account on Twitter has already been search-banned
By Twitter and is hidden by default. Only after clicking the “Hide sensitive information” box in Twitter’s search settings will users be able to see the account. Sweeney’s account is still suspended in the interim.
Nevertheless, Sweeney still has a sizable fan base across all his social media platforms, including Facebook, Telegram, Instagram, and Twitter’s newest competitor Mastodon.
Notably, Sweeney has acknowledged following the flights of other famous people, like Kim Kardashian and Taylor Swift, claiming that doing so is lawful and that the information is kept confidential. He told The Times in an interview that “these signals are there, and it’s legitimate to receive them.” And he asserts that to justify tracking Musk’s flight, “Being a celebrity entails the inevitable posting of information about oneself. I started as a fan and didn’t want to hurt Elon.”
How long Sweeney will be able to manage the new Twitter account is unknown. Users suspended from the site are also forbidden from opening new accounts following the platform’s “ban evasion” policy. The Twitter policy states that the company “reserves the right to also permanently suspend any additional accounts we feel the same account holder or entity may be operating in violation of our prior suspension.”
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