The college student who ran the Twitter account which tracked Elon Musk’s private jet is back on the platform after his original account was banned.
Jack Sweeney, 20, initially created an account to track the billionaire’s private jet in real time in 2020, claiming he was a ‘fan’ of the Tesla entrepreneur, now owner and CEO of Twitter. However, that account – @ElonJet – was suspended from Twitter on December 14, with Elon Musk citing his personal security concerns.
However, Sweeney is now back on Twitter with a new account – @ElonJetNextDay – which is essentially the same as the previous account, albeit with a 24-hour delay, just days after Musk had threatened to sue him following his suspension.
Musk had initially posted on Twitter that anyone sharing real-time information about the location of an individual would be suspended, claiming that flight tracking accounts like Sweeney’s posed a direct threat to the safety and wellbeing of the jets’ owners and passengers.
“Any account doxxing real-time location info of anyone will be suspended, as it is a physical safety violation,” Musk wrote on Twitter on December 15. “This includes posting links to sites with real-time location info. Posting locations someone traveled to on a slightly delayed basis isn’t a safety problem, so is ok.”
After launching his new account, Sweeney told Business Insider that he will be updating flight location data manually for the time being as ‘the framework for automating isn’t there yet.’ However, he hopes it will be fully automated in the future.
It’s not just Elon Musk that Jack Sweeney has been tracking. The student ran more than 30 Twitter accounts that followed the private jets of various billionaires, politicians, and celebrities, including Facebook and Amazon founders Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos and former President Donald Trump.
Sweeney also mentioned to Business Insider that most of these accounts, including @ElonJet, are still available on other social media platforms, such as TruthSocial, which still allow real-time location-tracking accounts. He also said he would set up new tracking accounts on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.
His new Twitter account, @ElonJetNextDay, is currently still posting and has already amassed more than 18,000 followers. However, if the unpredictable first few months of Musk’s Twitter reign are anything to go by, then it’s anyone’s guess as to how long it will still be online.
The social media company’s own rules even suggest that Sweeney could be violating the terms and conditions of the platform: “If an account has been permanently suspended for severe violations of the Twitter Rules, Twitter reserves the right to also permanently suspend any other account we believe the same account holder or entity may be operating in violation of our earlier suspension, regardless of when the other account was created,” reads a statement in Twitter’s Help Center.
