Elon Musk threatens legal action against ElonJet founders
Elon Musk has banned tracker ElonJet and its founder from Twitter. Now he says he’s also taking legal action against Jack Sweeney, the app’s creator and a 19-year-old freshman at the University of Central Florida, for allegedly causing harm to his family.
Musk announced his intentions Wednesday night in another announcement that the platform had permanently suspended the @ElonJet account, which tracked Musk’s private jet flights, as well as Sweeney’s personal account.
According to Musk, on December 13, a car carrying his two-year-old son X was being pursued by a “crazy stalker (thinking it was me)” who blocked and climbed onto the hood of one of the vehicles.
“Legal action is being taken against Sweeney and organizations that have supported harm to my family,” he said.
Musk did not explain how the flight-tracking app is related to the alleged incident involving his son. According to the Musk jet tracker, which is still active on Facebook and Instagram, Musk did not fly on December 13, although he did on December 12.
Sweeney began tracking the billionaire’s jet, he says, because he was a fan. And the data is collected by ADS-B Exchange, a larger hobbyist site that compiles publicly available data from various aircraft’s transponders. Because the data is publicly available, it’s uncertain what legal recourse Musk can take.
Musk has never been a fan of Sweeney’s jet tracker. In January, he sent Sweeney a message asking him to turn off the tracker and offering him $5,000 to delete the account, saying he didn’t want “crazy people” tracking his flights. Sweeney turned down the offer, suggesting that Musk instead pay him $50,000 or offer him an internship in exchange for disabling the app. Musk declined.
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