Twitter suspended several journalists who work for the Washington Post, New York Times, CNN and others Thursday evening after they allegedly posted the “real-time location” of Elon Musk and his family. Musk is the new CEO and owner of the social media platform.
No official explanation from the company was made although Musk posted a number of tweets with his rationale. “Criticizing me all day long is totally fine, but doxxing my real-time location and endangering my family is not,” Musk tweeted and pinned to the top of his profile.
“Doxxing” refers to publishing online the private information of someone’s address or other identifying details. Musk claimed in another tweet the journalists posted his “exact real-time location, basically assassination coordinates, in (obvious) direct violation of Twitter terms of service.”
Twitter recently updated its terms of service to include prohibiting the sharing of someone’s private information. Musk provided no evidence of the violation and the suspended journalists were given no official explanation or warning. The accounts will be temporarily suspended for seven days, according to a post from Musk, for engaging in doxxing.
The suspensions came just hours after Musk permanently banned an account that tracked the location of his private jet. Jack Sweeney, who ran the @ElonJet account, said he used publicly available flight tracking information to publish when and where Musk’s Gulfstream took-off and landed.
Some on Twitter are claiming that Musk’s plane data is not public because he uses the Federal Aviation Administration’s privacy ICAO address program that keeps the owner of the airplane anonymous. If true, it appears Sweeney might have found a workaround to post Musk’s private transportation information in real-time.
After Sweeney was banned on Wednesday he set up accounts on Facebook and Mastodon. The reporters allegedly included links to those social media accounts in their reporting of the Sweeney ban.
In a Twitter Spaces session Thursday night, Musk said the journalists were engaging in “ban evasion” by posting links on Twitter to Sweeney’s other social media accounts tracking his plane.
News Outlets Respond to Suspensions
Debate roiled on Twitter late into Thursday evening over the ethics of suppressing the reporting of professional journalists and effectively censoring the press. Washington Post’s executive editor, Sally Buzbee, called for reporter Drew Harwell’s Twitter account to be reinstated. The suspension “directly undermines Elon Musk’s claim that he intends to run Twitter as a platform dedicated to free speech. Harwell was banished from Twitter without warning, process or explanation, following the publication of his accurate reporting about Musk,” she said.
CNN also posted a statement Thursday night relaying their concerns over the suspension of their reporter. “The impulsive and unjustified suspension of a number of reporters, including CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan, is concerning but not surprising... We have asked Twitter for an explanation, and we will reevaluate our relationship based on that response.”
Society of Professional Journalists National President Claire Regan released a statement defending the reporters, saying they were just doing their job. “The SPJ Code of Ethics states journalists must hold those in power accountable, while still minimizing harm. This includes reporting in real time and engaging directly with the public they serve,” she wrote.
Hypocrisy or a father protecting his child?
Journalist Bari Weiss criticized Musk for doing what he condemned the previous management of doing. Weiss, along with several other reporters, was recently granted inside access to Twitter by Musk in order to report on the decision by Twitter’s former leaders to ban former President Donald Trump and censor the New York Post. She and others published their findings in a series called “Twitter files,”
“The old regime at Twitter governed by its own whims and biases and it sure looks like the new regime has the same problem,” Weiss wrote Friday morning. Musk responded to her tweet by saying that one of his children was at the location published by the reporters. “What should the consequence of doxxing someone’s real-time, exact location be? Assume your child is at that location, as mine was.”
Weiss and others also denounced journalists who are now condemning Musk but were silent when previous Twitter management censored other journalists’ reporting. “I don’t need to dwell on how mesmerizing it is to watch those journalists who defended—even celebrated!—Twitter’s bans under the old regime under the guise of ‘safety’ now call it censorship, and say it infringes on freedom of expression,” she wrote.
Many have noted, along with Weiss, that two wrongs don’t make a right.
Mixed Reaction from Political Left and Right
New York Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told Musk to “lay off the proto-fascism.” The congresswoman, who often clashes with the the Twitter CEO, said she understands feeling unsafe, “but descending into abuse of power and erratically banning journalists only increases the intensity around you.”
Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow Christopher Rufo tweeted that he feels Twitter needs a clear, consistent set of rules, applied transparently and with the possibility of appeal. “Doxxing should be prohibited... but it should be a clear policy, not a changing standard,” Rufo wrote. “Arbitrary enforcement was bad before and it’s bad now.”
California Democratic Congressman Ted Lieu responded to a tweet that said Congress should demand an explanation. Lieu disagreed, “The First Amendment prevents Congress from regulating speech on Twitter, a private business.” He continued, “It is not Government’s role to tell Twitter who to ban, who to suspend or who to promote.”