Press freedom advocates on Thursday censured Twitter proprietor Elon Musk, who has suspended the records of a few high-profile columnists who cover the extremely rich person and his tumultuous initiative for the web-based entertainment website.
Following a sudden change in policy regarding accounts that share the travels of private jets using publicly available information, Musk made the highly unusual move of removing journalists from Twitter.
Musk announced via Twitter that users who break the new policy will be banned for seven days.
The disagreement between Musk and the jet-tracking account was the subject of numerous tweets and articles by many of the journalists who were suspended on Thursday night.
CNN's D O N-I-E O'Sullivan is among the reporters whose accounts were suspended. The New York Times' Ryan Mac; From the Washington Post, Drew Harwell; From the Intercept, Micah Lee; and Aaron Rupar, a journalist.
Rupar wrote that he doesn't know why he was suspended in a post on Substack. He claimed that on Wednesday, he did tweet a link to the jet-tracking account's Facebook page.
Maybe that made it happen," Rupar composed". However, I am still unsure of the policy that could have been broken.
Musk's move was deemed troubling by J-A M-I L J-A F-E R, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.
J-A F-E R made the following statement: "Musk suspending journalists' accounts is petty, vindictive, and absolutely disgraceful—and especially so because Musk has styled himself, however absurdly, as a champion of free speech"
Senior counsel at the advocacy group Free Press, Nora Benavidez, concurred with J-A F-E R remarks, stating that "setting a dangerous precedent" involves suspending journalists for what appears to be personal animosity.
Benavidez said, "Musk already has a long track record of trying to silence people he dislikes or speech that is critical of him". He also said that suspending journalists "endangers the broader public's ability to know what is happening inside Twitter".
Ella Irwin, the head of Trust & Safety at Twitter, said in a statement to NPR that now it is against the company's policies to share people's real-time location information on Twitter.
"I can confirm that we will suspend any accounts that violate our privacy policies and put other users at risk", Irwin stated, "without commenting on any specific user accounts". This policy does not apply to journalists or any other accounts.
Musk stated on Twitter shortly after the suspensions that the actions were not in response to critical coverage.
Condemning me the entire day is absolutely fine, yet doxxing my constant area and imperiling my family isn't, Musk tweeted
Suspensions follow Musk's 'crazy stalker' allegations
According to Musk's claim that the accounts amounted to "doxxing," or the sharing of personal information to encourage harassers, Musk suspended accounts on Wednesday that tracked the movement of private jets used by billionaires, government officials, and others, including Musk's own plane.
Additionally, Musk asserted that a 20-year-old University of Florida student's @ElonJet account was used by a "crazy stalker" in Los Angeles to track a car carrying one of Musk's children.
On Thursday, in addition to the journalists, a Twitter account associated with Mastodon, a social media platform that is considered to be an alternative to Twitter, was also suspended. Following Musk's crackdown, the creator of the Elon Jet account visited Mastodon, among other sites.
Musk, a self-described "free speech absolutist," has reinstated many accounts that had been removed from Twitter, including the account of former President Trump and numerous banned far-right conspiracists.
In addition, Musk has made use of his new platform to promote the so-called Twitter Files, a collection of internal documents that he claimed would reveal a censorship scandal but instead revealed tangled internal debates over contentious issues
You must be logged in to post a comment.