Elon Musk calls out Twitter for lack of effort in removing bots

By Johnna Crider

Posted on September 6, 2022

Elon Musk called out Twitter for the social network’s lack of effort in removing bots and spam accounts today. His response was to The Future Funds’ Gary Black who said that Elon Musk should be very careful to not disrespect Twitter’s counsel. 

“Judge McCormick is a no-nonsense judge with a gift for wicked prose. She will tear Elon apart if he shows disrespect for the court. See Friday’s ruling on David Sacks subpoenas,” Black wrote on Twitter. Elon Musk advised Black to read the actual ruling and pointed out that he had nothing to do with David Sacks’ response.

Elon added that all potential witnesses have been advised to provide full cooperation with the court. Then he called out Twitter for prioritizing sending out subpoenas over removing bots and spam accounts. 

If Twitter put as much effort into bot/spam removal as they do into subpoenas, we wouldn’t have this problem in the first place!

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 6, 2022

“If Twitter put as much effort into bot/spam removal as they do into subpoenas, we wouldn’t have this problem in the first place!”

You may remember that thread Elon Musk posted to Twitter yesterday with his opinion on the new Lord of The Rings series. What was casually overlooked by many reporting on the topic was another screenshot of bots spamming Elon’s replies on Twitter.

And 90% of my comments are bots 🤖 pic.twitter.com/A7RKyNJZoR

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 5, 2022

This isn’t the first time bots and scam accounts (most likely bots, also) have plagued the Tesla CEO’s personal Twitter account. Verified accounts have even been hacked. I shared Andrea Stroppa’s story when he lost his Twitter verification when he took action to protect his account from hacked verified Twitter accounts. Andrea changed his user name which is a big no-no for Twitter’s verified users.

Another verified account changed its user name and lost its verification status. You may remember Tesla China being verified on Twitter.  Tesla China changed its username to Tesla Asia and lost its verification status.

Twitter is very strict when it comes to verified accounts however, seems to be pretty lenient when hacked verified accounts change their names and target individuals using the platform. Elon Musk, in my opinion, was right to call out Twitter over prioritizing suing him and sending out subpoenas over solving the issues that encouraged Elon to back out of the deal.

My question to Twitter: are your bots and spam account really worth protecting?

Your feedback is important. If you have any comments, or concerns, or see a typo, you can email me at johnna@teslarati.com. You can also reach me on Twitter at @JohnnaCrider1

Elon Musk calls out Twitter for lack of effort in removing bots