Musk Threatens To Sue Microsoft For ‘Illegal’ Use Of Twitter Data

Billionaire businessman and Twitter CEO, Elon Musk, has threatened to sue American tech multinational, Microsoft, for illegally using Twitter data.

Microsoft had announced its intention to drop Twitter from its corporate advertising platform, Smart Campaigns.

This comes after Twitter started charging $100 a month as Application Programming Interface (API) fees for third parties to access the data it collects from users which they have chosen to share publicly.

Reacting to Microsoft’s decision to drop Twitter, Musk said the former had already used Twitter’s data to train Smart Campaign’s artificial intelligence.

“They trained illegally using Twitter data. Lawsuit time,” he tweeted.

They trained illegally using Twitter data. Lawsuit time.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 19, 2023

In a separate tweet, while responding to another Twitter user, Musk said he is open to other ideas on using Twitter data, however, “ripping off” the database was not the way to go.

“I’m open to ideas, but ripping off the Twitter database, demonetizing it (removing ads), and then selling our data to others isn’t a winning solution,” he said.

In a notice shared on its website, Microsoft said its advertising platform would no longer support Twitter from Tuesday 25th April 2023.

“Starting on April 25, 2023, Smart Campaigns with Multi-platform will no longer support Twitter.

“As of April 25, 2023, you’ll be unable to: access your Twitter account through our social management tool, create and manage drafts or tweets, view past tweets and engagement, and schedule tweets,” the notice read.

Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn will, however, still be available on Smart Campaign.