Jack Sweeney of elonjet Responds

The relevant section of the anti-doxxing law, California PC 653.2:

a) Every person who, with intent to place another person in reasonable fear for his or her safety, or the safety of the other person’s immediate family, by means of an electronic communication device, and without consent of the other person, and for the purpose of imminently causing that other person unwanted physical contact, injury, or harassment, by a third party, electronically distributes, publishes, e-mails, hyperlinks, or makes available for downloading, personal identifying information, including, but not limited to, a digital image of another person, or an electronic message of a harassing nature about another person, which would be likely to incite or produce that unlawful action, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in a county jail, by a fine of not more than one thousand dollars ($1,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment.

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...

Ignoring the safety concern on one side, and the emission of greenhouse gases on the other, the way this works is interesting and surprisingly straightforward! https://github.com/Jxck-S/plane-notify/blob/multi/PseudoCode...

If I understand correctly, the plane broadcasts ACARS data which include the registration number, and ADS-B data which includes the 24-bit ICAO address, which hobbyists both record and share in an API that can be queried. Then the code computes departures and arrivals from the distance to the nearest airport at low altitude.

The jet likely changed its ICAO address through PIA, but the set of possible ICAO addresses that could be the right one after it switched ICAO address is small, because the switch happened at a known airport, and because PIA privacy protection has an assigned range of registration numbers and ICAO addresses. Among those, there was only one that matched the departure/arrival pattern of the pre-PIA, known ICAO address associated with the target jet.

If Elon is truly worried about his children's safety - irregardless of the baby mamma - he simply needs to stop using/owning a private jet. If he time shared or chartered a jet it would be impossible to know which jet to track on a regular basis or who was on it. It would also be cheaper for him since he is homeless. Better yet use the airlines - better for the environment like a Tesla.

>Even companies like FlightAware and FlightRadar24 rely on hobbyists to receive this data.

Businesses blatantly operating in violation of EU laws might not be the best example here.