The owner of a Twitter account that’s spent the past two years tracking billionaire Elon Musk’s flight location says his account is being “shadow banned.” That accusation comes despite recent public assurances from Musk that he wasn’t taking action against the account.
The account’s owner, named Jack Sweeney, claims an anonymous Twitter employee told him that the account for his popular ElonJet tracker bot was given limited visibility, “to a severe degree,” starting on December 2. Sweeney then went on to post a screenshot, allegedly showing Twitter’s Vice President of Trust and Safety Ella Irwin asking team members to, “apply heavy VF [visibility filtering] to @elonjet immediately.” Sweeney disclosed the information in a Twitter thread which he called, “MyTwitter Files.”
Screenshots show Ella Irwin VP at Twitter Trust and Safety requesting elonjet to have heavy VF (visibility filtering) pic.twitter.com/ehHJpo4zQR
— Jack Sweeney (@JxckSweeney) December 11, 2022
Sweeney, a first-year student at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, says he uses publicly available transponder data from Musk’s private plane to track its location. That data, which includes the plane’s altitude, latitude, longitude, and heading are then fed into an algorithm he created. The @ElonJet bot then takes that information and Tweets out when Musk takes off and lands.
Though similar trackers exist for other major figures like Mark Zuckerberg, Drake, and Jeff Bezos, ElonJet stands apart because it’s managed to draw the sustained ire of its target. Back in January, Sweeney told The New York Times Musk personally reached out to him over DMs asking him to remove the bot in exchange for $US5,000 ($6,941). Sweeney counter offered, saying he would consider deactivating the account for $US50,000 ($69,410) or even an internship at one of Musk’s companies. Musk, who’s said he believes social media accounts tracking his whereabouts are “security issues,” reportedly cut off communications with the teen.
Months later, Musk officially announced he intended to acquire Twitter, leading many to wonder if the billionaire would move to ban Sweeney’s bot account. At the time, Sweeney said he was making backup plans to keep the bot active on other platforms, “in case this [Twitter] account disappears.”
Just in case this account disappears on Twitter, it doesn’t mean the end of ElonJet
Also on the following.
Instagram https://t.co/o2Xll4uuBW
Facebook https://t.co/OQZor85VBR
Telegram https://t.co/qE8JL6h8tm
Other links https://t.co/a6Cb3Nrdwg— ElonJet (@ElonJet) April 25, 2022
Given Musk’s inconsistent rantings in favour of free speech and repeated criticisms of Twitter’s past content moderation philosophy, it was unclear whether he would take action against the account once he officially owned the platform. Musk addressed the issue in early November, saying he would ban the @ElonJet account due to free speech principles.
“My commitment to free speech extends even to not banning the account following my plane, even though that is a direct personal safety risk,” Musk said in the Tweet.
Sweeney replied to the tweet, thanking Musk for his decision and saying the majority of his accounts followers were actually supporters of Musk and his companies.
My commitment to free speech extends even to not banning the account following my plane, even though that is a direct personal safety risk
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2022
Gizmodo reached out to Twitter for comment on Sweeney’s claims but has not heard back. Twitter’s communications team reportedly endured major cuts as part of the company’s 3,700 personal layoffs.
Sweeney’s claims as Musk continues to publicise the so-called “Twitter Files” which, amongst other things, have publicized internal documents displaying Twitter’s approach to restricting a certain account’s visibility.
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