Elon Musk threatened to sue Jack Sweeney for disclosing the location of his private jet, but Jack Sweeney believes that threat is most likely a bluff.
In an interview with ABC News, Sweeney stated, “I don’t think that’ll happen.” That would only make things worse for him moving forward.
The self-described aviation enthusiast and 20-year-old University of Central Florida student created a tool to track the whereabouts of private aircraft, including Elon Musk.
Since starting the program as his first coding project, Sweeney claims he has gradually gained followers. Sweeney even claims Musk offered him $5,000 last January to remove the program’s link from his Twitter account and make it more difficult to find Musk, but their negotiations came to a standstill.
He managed tracking accounts for numerous planes connected to celebrities and official organizations.
The @ElonJet account, Sweeney’s personal account, the accounts for Sweeney’s other jet trackers, and later the accounts of many journalists who Musk claimed had revealed or “doxxed” his location were all suspended this week by Twitter, which Musk purchased in October.
Musk tweeted on Wednesday that suspending any accounts that “Any account doxxing real-time location info of anyone will be suspended, as it is a physical safety violation,” which is the reason Sweeney’s accounts were deleted.
According to some observers, Musk’s position from when he tweeted, “My commitment to free speech extends even to not banning the account following my plane, even though that is a direct personal safety risk.” November has changed since then.
“It’s a complete flip really,” Sweeney said.
Musk reopened the journalists’ accounts on Saturday after a Twitter poll revealed that the majority of respondents favoured doing so; Sweeney’s personal account, @ElonJet, and his other accounts are still suspended.
A video of a car that Musk said was being driven by “a crazy stalker” who blocked his car and climbed onto its hood was also uploaded by Musk on Wednesday. Legal action is being initiated against Sweeney and groups that advocated harm to his family, he continued.
The previous tweet from @ElonJet was sent more than 24 hours before the incident, and Sweeney refuted the claim that he was engaging in stalking by pointing out that the area linked to Musk’s video was far from any airport.
“He literally uses the word that I supported harm against him,” Sweeney said. “I don’t support that; I did this because I was a fan.”
Sweeney went on to say that he was a supporter of Musk’s businesses SpaceX and Tesla when he first started @ElonJet.
“Just like the $5,000, I think he just expected me to, you know, give up,” Sweeney said. “Just because you’re someone I followed, and I was a fan. I’m not gonna you know, listen to everything you say.”
“You dox, you get suspended,” Musk said Friday on a Twitter space online forum with over 30,000 attendees including Sweeney. “End of story.”
Musk’s contributions to the discussion at the forum, in Sweeney’s opinion, were minimal.
“He kind of just said that and rage quit,” Sweeney said.
Professor at the United States Naval Academy and cybersecurity specialist Jeff Kosseff pointed out that “doxxing” does not have a specific legal definition and is not a separate crime.
“It very well could violate cyberbullying or harassment laws, depending on the specific case and law,” Kosseff said.
A private firm, like Twitter, can establish and uphold any definition it sees fit, according to Kosseff.
Sweeney said he would support his proposal even if Musk takes legal action.
“If Elon tries to come after me legally, you know, I’ll be there,” he said.
