Elon Musk reinstates the Twitter accounts of several journalists he had suspended

Elon Musk reestablished the accounts of Twitter of several journalists who had been suspended for a day for a controversy over the publication of data on the billionaire’s plane.

The reinstatements come after the suspensions drew harsh criticism from government officials, rights groups and journalistic organizations around the world on Friday, with some saying the social media platform was jeopardizing press freedom. .

Look: Twitter Suspends Accounts of CNN, New York Times and Washington Post Journalists Covering Elon Musk

A Twitter poll that Musk conducted later also showed that the majority of respondents wanted the accounts reinstated immediately.

“The people have spoken. The suspension of the accounts that spied on my location will now be lifted.”said Musk in a tweet on Saturday.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. A Reuters check showed that the suspended accounts, which included journalists from the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post, have been reinstated.

Authorities from France, Germany, Great Britain and the European Union had condemned the suspensions.

The episode, which a well-known security researcher described as “Thursday night massacre”is being considered by critics as further proof that Muskwhich is considered afreedom of expression absolutist”, removes speeches and users that you personally do not like.

Shares of Tesla, an electric car maker run by Muskplunged 4.7% on Friday and posted its worst weekly loss since March 2020, with investors increasingly worried about the distraction of their president and a slowdown in the global economy.

Roland Lescure, the French industry minister, tweeted on Friday that, following the suspension of Musk to journalists, it would suspend its own activity on Twitter.

Melissa Fleming, the head of communications for the United Nations, tweeted that she was “deeply disturbed” for the suspensions and that “Freedom of the media is not a toy.”

The people have spoken.

Accounts who doxxed my location will have their suspension lifted now. https://t.co/MFdXbEQFCe

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 17, 2022

The German Foreign Office warned Twitter that the ministry had a problem with moves that endangered press freedom.

The suspensions stemmed from a disagreement over a Twitter account called ElonJet, which tracked the private plane of Musk using publicly available information.

Twitter had suspended the account and others that tracked private planes on Wednesday, despite Musk having previously tweeted that he would not suspend ElonJet in the name of free speech.

Shortly after, Twitter changed its privacy policy to prohibit sharing “live location information”.

Then, on Thursday night, several journalists, including from the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post, were suspended from Twitter without notice.

In an email sent to Reuters overnight, Twitter’s head of trust and safety, Ella Irwin, said the team manually reviewed “each and every account” who violated the new privacy policy by posting direct links to the ElonJet account.

“I understand that the focus seems to be mostly on journalist accounts, but today we have applied the policy equally to journalist and non-journalist accounts”Irwin said in the email.

The Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing said in a statement Friday that Twitter’s shares “They violate the spirit of the First Amendment and the principle that social media platforms will allow the unfiltered distribution of information that is already public.”

Musk accused journalists of publishing their location in real time, which are “basically coordinates for the murder” of his family.

Source: Elcomercio

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I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.