Elon Musk jet-tracking account moves to Twitter rival Threads

One of Elon Musk’s least-favorite Twitter users is moving to Meta’s competing platform Threads.

An illustration picture shows two mobile phones displaying the login page of the social media app 'Threads' (L) and the 'Twitter' account of Elon Musk in Los Angeles on June 6. The new messaging app launched by Mark Zuckerberg is a direct competitor to Musk's Twitter. Mandatory Credit: Etienne Laurent/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Originally Published: 10 JUL 23 12:20 ET

By Chris Isidore, CNN

New York (CNN) — One of Elon Musk’s least-favorite Twitter users is moving to Meta’s competing platform Threads.

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Jack Sweeney — the Florida college student who started the ElonJet Twitter account that used a bot to track the location of Musk’s private jet using publicly available data — started an account named “elonmusksjet” on Threads last week soon after Meta launched the platform.

Sweeney’s project gained notoriety in early 2022 when Musk offered him $5,000 to stop posting his plane’s location, and the student replied with a request for $50,000. Musk, who was worth more than $200 billion at that time according to estimates, turned down his request.

In December after Musk bought Twitter, he permanently suspended Sweeney’s @ElonJet account, claiming it posed a security threat to him and family members by revealing their locations in real time. The account had amassed more than 500,000 followers at the time it was suspended.

Meta (FB), which also owns Facebook and Instagram, launched Threads as a rival to Twitter last week. It had a massive 70 million sign-ups in less than 48 hours.

24-hour delay account

Sweeney has continued to tweet the location of Musk’s jet with a 24-hour delay, using the account @ElonJetNextDay, though that account has a far more modest 25,600 followers.

Musk had said a 24-hour delay of flight information would be allowed under Twitter’s new rules set up to suspend @ElonJet. And Sweeney continues to tweet under a personal account, using it to announce the move of ElonJets to Threads.

The first Threads post on the elonmusksjet account was one announcing that ElonJet had landed on Threads, followed by one asking Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg if the account could stay.

But the elonmusksjet account was temporarily blocked, according to a posting on Sweeney’s personal Threads account, which included a screenshot of message he received from Threads telling him the elonmusksjet account was active once again following a requested review.

“We’re sorry we got this wrong,” said the message. “Sometimes we need to take action to help keep our community safe.”

Since then the Threads account has tracked one Musk flight, from Austin to Brownsville, Texas three days ago.

Sweeney also operates a separate Threads account called zuckerbergjet, but it has yet to track any flights since it went live on Threads at the same time elonmusksjet did.