[kcplate]

People keep saying that yet no one has been able to define to me what “legitimate interest” the public has for tracking a private plane. I don’t believe one exists.

If you are sure of yourself, do a little experiment. If you truly believe it’s legitimate, why not just buy an AirTag and hide it on a person’s car…perhaps a local well known business owner. Create a website that publishes the live location of the vehicle. Let us know here how that goes for you.

[davely]

Ah, personally, I think getting hung up on the whole " legitimate public interest" argument is a distraction.

The simple fact of the matter is that due to how this data is created, it's publicly accessible information: All airplanes flying in civilian airspace are required to broadcast ADS-B data for safety reasons. It gives controllers (and other aircraft in your nearby airspace) a view of what's happening. Your airplane essentially broadcasts a payload every second that sends out your GPS coordinates, heading, speed, altitude, aircraft identification information, etc.

The COOL thing (speaking as an aviation geek), is that you can buy a cheap little antenna, plug it into a Raspberry Pi and start seeing these raw packets from airplanes FLYING OVER YOUR HOUSE. FlightRadar24 and ADSB Exchange basically crowd source a bunch of real-time data from people who have these antennas and are running various types of software.

Basically, since this is happening in public view and the data is available (primarily for safety reasons), then there is really no reasonable expectation of privacy. In a way, it's like people taking a photo of you on the street and posting about it -- since you're in a public space, there is no expectation of privacy. You might not like it, morally it might feel wrong, but there is no reasonable legal reason that bans this.

Fortunately (for Elon), he is a billionaire and can lobby to change laws he doesn't like if he so wishes.

[kcplate]

Data can be created and used for a legitimate purposes, using this data for aerospace safety is a positive and legitimate use of the data. Hobbyist use of the day could be considered legitimate and appropriate as well. However, the same data can be used for negative reasons too.

I don’t question the legal right to use this data this way, although I think good arguments could be made that if you are using the data this way, your intention is suspicious and you invite scrutiny. I am challenging the folks commenting here that the data being used this way is a positive use of the data.

[jjav]

> People keep saying that yet no one has been able to define to me what “legitimate interest” the public has for tracking a private plane. I don’t believe one exists.

If you have an objection to this tracking, you'd have to take it up with the FAA. Because the legitimate interest is that the rules require airplanes to transmit this information any anyone is free to listen to it.

Which is a great thing for aviation safety, so I'm glad the rules exist.

[zoklet-enjoyer]

Yes but creating a page to broadcast the location of an individual is weird and not ok. Why does it matter that it's trivial and legal to do?

[jonathanlb]

> weird and not ok

I mean, that particular individual is in turn weird and not okay.

But who am I to say? And what does it matter if something is weird and not okay? Lots of things fit that bill, and that doesn't mean they shouldn't exist.

[zoklet-enjoyer]

If you owned a website like Twitter it would be perfectly fine for you to ban users for posting that information.

[arrrg]

Sure (in certain jurisdictions). But is that good policy?

Obviously not.

[zoklet-enjoyer]

I don't see anything wrong with it. The jet kid can create his own website

[jeffbee]

Not the same thing. The airspace above the United States belongs to the people thereof, who have promulgated regulations requiring aircraft to be equipped with ADS-B. You might not see the "legitimate interest" but frankly nobody asked you. Those are the rules.

[kcplate]

So the private vehicle driving around a public road equipped with a government required license plate that can be used to ID who owns the vehicle…yada yada yada. Zero parallels there.

Also I should note, that nobody asked me if I think people who intentionally cyberstalk folks online using public information are slimy either…(but I do).

[jeffbee]

I recently read this book. I think you could benefit from reading it. It's about how escalation of language—as you just did my moving up to "cyberstalking"—is used by people to escape responsibilities.

https://www.amazon.com/Conflict-Not-Abuse-Overstating-Respon...

[kcplate]

>escape responsibilities

Just exactly what “responsibilities” do you perceive me to have in this discussion? Others are advocating monitoring another person’s property using technology and publishing it on the internet. I am suggesting that there is no reasonable civil reason to do so. The only “responsibility” I have here is to be true to my opinion. I stand by it.

Also, I used the term “cyberstalking” because that is exactly what it is. Here is a Wikipedia page on the term:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberstalking

According to that page cyberstalking is the use of the internet and technology to stalk an individual and those actions “may include monitoring”.

Here is the definition of “stalk”:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalking

“Stalking is unwanted and/or repeated surveillance by an individual or group toward another person”

If you find fault in my definition, feel free to push an edit to those Wikipedia pages.

[nephanth]

One "legitimate interest" lies in attracting attention to their horrible carbon footprint

[kcplate]

I think that is what people might be pointing to as justification, but isn’t that simply a bullying tactic?