Jet-Tracking Apps: The New Celebrity Paparazzi
We’ve all witnessed “traditional” paparazzi sticking to the celebrities like a shadow, following them all over to get a picture – but the tables are starting to turn. With new apps coming out everyday the option to track any plane has become somewhat easy and tracking famous people’s private jets has become a new “trend”. So, are the jet-tracking apps the new celebrity paparazzi? Let’s take a closer look.
How Jet-Tracking Became a Trend
Why wait outside a restaurant where a celebrity you admire is supposed to have a meal, when you can just refresh an app and know where they’re headed next. Isn’t all this a bit crazy and scary? The recent advances in technology have made all this possible, with apps like FlightAware, Flightradar24, ADS-B Exchange you can even track flights in real time and have access to public data, and that is just the tip of the iceberg.
Influencers and “curious” fans now share all this on social media platforms and guessing which tropical island your favorite celebrity is flying to next is becoming as easy as predicting the weather.
The Viral Impact of Jack Sweeney’s Celebrity Jet Tracking
You have most probably heard of Jack Sweeny, a college student, who made headlines in 2020, when he made a profile about tracking Elon Musk’s private jet using publicly available data. He called this “project” ElonJet and went viral on Twitter, now X. Musk even offered him money to take the tracker down, but he declined and asked for more instead – plus an internship, an offer Musk refused.
His first profile ElonJet was suspended in 2022 due to new Twitter policies. However, he created a second account on which he now shows flight data with a minimum 24-hour delay. He recently offered to delete the account on his X page if Elon accepted to sponsor the UCF stadium.
Gulfstream 650ER, one of Elon Musk’s Jets
By dxme from Schweiz – Swiss Jet AG Gulfstream GVI (G650) | HB-JUF | ZRH, CC BY-SA 2.0
Sweeny found this as his new hobby – or job and continued to track the private jets of other celebrities such as Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg. He also made a tracking account about Taylor Swift and got a letter from her legal team explaining that this is more than a game and that he will get sued if he continues.
Social media platforms such as TikTok have made content like tracking celebrities’ jets viral with users producing thousands of videos that track the flights in real-time. On these platforms you can find people tracking Kylie Jenner’s jet or people following Taylor Swift’s private jet so they can vandalize it – you can read more about this case in our article “Europe’s War on Aviation: Ban Private Jets and “Climate Change”.
This new era of “stalking” is getting crazier day by day and some may view this as a game, but, these jet-tracking apps are often described as the new form of celebrity paparazzi that allow fans to track private jet flights in real-time, turning a once-private aspect of celebrity life into a public spectacle.
So… What’s Next for Jet-Tracking?
The future could go one of two ways – lawmakers may step in and make regulations to protect these billionaires’ privacies, such as restricting who can view certain data but this is also very questionable because as seen before, technology will continue to advance and be one step further.
One of the things that could happen is that these apps will take off very fast and soon we’ll be able to track the passengers by their names, their meals, video streaming, and other things.
Some even go on to say that there may also be a method to follow private helicopters or yachts, because guess what – if it flies, floats, or moves, app developers may make an app to track it all down!
The New Paparazzi Are Here
Jet-tracking has changed the way fans and the public interact with celebrities.
The days when people needed expensive cameras and insider tips to catch a glimpse of their favorite stars are gone. All they need now is an internet connection and a tracking app.
This trend raises the importance of the question: Can celebrities’ escape the public eye for a moment when their profession puts them in a position where their every action is exhibited to the whole world?
