ElonJet still on Truth Social — Twitter suspends @ElonJet plane-tracking bot after Musk pledged to leave it up Twitter claims Musk plane bot broke the rules but lets Gates and Zuck bots stay up.
Jon Brodkin – Dec 14, 2022 4:25 pm UTC Enlarge / Elon Musk during a press conference after a SpaceX launch at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 2, 2019. Getty Images | Jim Watson reader comments 93 with 0 posters participating Share this story Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Reddit
Twitter suspended the ElonJet account that tracks the movements of Elon Musk’s private jet, despite Musk previously stating he would leave the account up as part of his “commitment to free speech.”
“Well it appears @ElonJet is suspended,” account creator Jack Sweeney wrote today. He added that people can still follow the private jet bot on other platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, and Truth Social.
Clicking on the ElonJet Twitter account now shows a message that says, “Account suspended: Twitter suspends accounts that violate the Twitter Rules.” Sweeney also posted a screenshot of a message he received that said, “Your account is permanently suspended. After careful review, we determined your account broke the Twitter rules.” The message further said, “You won’t be able to create new accounts. If you think we got this wrong, you can submit an appeal.”
Sweeney is a student at the University of Central Florida. He has said Musk offered him $5,000 to disable the ElonJet account in 2021 before Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion. Advertisement
Before its suspension, the ElonJet account’s pinned tweet said, “This account has every right to post jet whereabouts, ADS-B data is public, every aircraft in the world is required to have a transponder… Twitter policy states data found on other sites is allowed to be shared here as well.” Gates and Zuckerberg plane bots still active
Sweeney also created numerous other plane-tracking bots, including one that follows the private jets of Russian oligarchs. That Twitter account is still visible as of today despite it performing the same function as the ElonJet account. Sweeney’s bots tracking NASA planes, Bill Gates’ jets, Mark Zuckerberg’s jet, and Air Force One are all still active as well.
Musk completed his Twitter takeover in late October and didn’t act immediately against ElonJet. “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 wrote on November 6.
But Sweeney later said he received internal messages from an anonymous employee showing that Twitter restricted the visibility of ElonJet on December 2. Sweeney tweeted on December 12 that the account’s visibility was restoredbut the account was suspended a mere two days later.
We emailed Sweeney about the ElonJet suspension and whether he will appeal it and will update this article if we get a response. reader comments 93 with 0 posters participating Share this story Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Reddit Jon Brodkin Jon is Ars Technica’s senior IT reporter, covering the FCC and broadband, telecommunications, tech policy, and more. Email jon.brodkin@arstechnica.com // Twitter @JBrodkin Advertisement Channel Ars Technica ← Previous story Related Stories Today on Ars