Twitter suspends journalists who have been covering Elon Musk and the

On Dec 16, 2022

Twitter on Thursday evening suddenly suspended several high-profile journalists who cover the platform and Elon Musk, one of the richest people in the world, who acquired the company just a few months ago.

Hours after the suspensions took hold, Musk faced off with one of the journalists he suspended in a Twitter Space audio discussion before an audience of more than 30,000 listeners. The suspended journalist, along with several others, found a backdoor way onto the platform through the website’s audio function.

“You doxx, you get suspended. End of story. That’s it,” Musk said, explaining his latest policy to the group, before he left minutes after having joined the discussion.

Musk was referring to Twitter’s latest rule change about accounts that track private jets, including one owned by Musk himself, which was put in place Wednesday.

The accounts of Ryan Mac of The New York Times, Donie O’Sullivan of CNN, Drew Harwell of The Washington Post, Matt Binder of Mashable, Micah Lee of The Intercept, Steve Herman of Voice of America and independent journalists Aaron Rupar, Keith Olbermann and Tony Webster had all been suspended as of Thursday evening.

The Twitter account for Mastodon, a platform billed as a Twitter alternative, was also suspended early Thursday evening. Twitter accounts operated by NBC News journalists were unable to tweet any links to Mastodon pages. Mastodon was, however, trending on Twitter.

Musk said the suspensions stemmed from the platform’s new rules banning private jet trackers, responding to a tweet from Mike Solana, a vice president of the venture capital firm Founders Fund, who noted that the suspended accounts had posted links to jet trackers on other websites.

“Criticizing me all day long is totally fine, but doxxing my real-time location and endangering my family is not,” he said in another tweet.

Musk tweeted that the accounts banned Thursday posted “my exact real-time location, basically assassination coordinates, in (obvious) direct violation of Twitter terms of service.” NBC News was unable to verify that allegation.

Musk later added that the suspensions would last seven days.

In early November, shortly after having taken control of Twitter, Musk tweeted that he would not ban the account that tracked his jet.

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Rupar wrote on Substack that his account was permanently suspended but that he had no other information.

“I haven’t heard anything from Twitter at all,” he wrote.

He noted that he had tweeted a link Wednesday to a Facebook page that tracked Musk’s jet.

Binder, a tech reporter at Mashable, said he was suspended after he tweeted a screenshot from another suspended reporter, CNN’s O’Sullivan, of a Los Angeles Police Department statement.

“I’ve been on it since 2008. I never got so much as a slap on the wrist, because I always follow the rules,” Binder said. “It’s not hard to do when you know what the rules are.”

Binder said his account notified him that he is permanently…