The FAA hiding private jet details might not stop celebrity jet trackers

Yesterday, we wrote that a new Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) process would help private jet owners keep their registration details private upon request, and speculated that it would make things difficult for celebrity jet trackers. Jack Sweeney, known for his accounts tracking the flights of celebrities like Elon Musk and Taylor Swift, says he doesn’t think it will.

In an email, Sweeney told The Verge that learning “who owns what planes already requires research,” and that he and other jet trackers often “use the media and associated sources” rather than the FAA’s database of registrations. 

The FAA said on Friday that it’s considering defaulting to withholding personally identifiable information from registration records. Even if jet trackers relied more on the FAA’s database, Sweeney suspected that the rule doesn’t apply to those who register their jets with trusts or other entities, something he says private jet owners do regularly. However, FAA spokesperson Kevin Morris told The Verge in an email that when it says it will withhold “personally identifiable information,” it’s referring “to both individuals and entities (trusts, LLCs, etc.) operating private aircraft.”

The FAA created its new process to comply with new requirements in the Biden-era FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024. The law was written in response to privacy concerns raised about jet trackers like Sweeney’s ElonJet account that Twitter banned in 2022 and Meta later banned on Threads and Instagram. 

We’ve also reached out to the National Business Aviation Association for comment on Sweeney’s commentary.