Elon Musk’s X is claiming it owns all its users’ accounts — including those belonging to conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’s Infowars, which is currently involved in a pending sale to satirical newspaper The Onion.
In a Monday filing to a federal judge in Texas, X argued that users do not own their accounts and cannot transfer them to third parties without the company’s explicit permission. While acknowledging that users retain ownership of their posted content, X emphasized that its terms of service grant users only a “non-exclusive license” to use their accounts.
The issue arose following The Onion’s successful bid to purchase Infowars at a bankruptcy auction, supported by Sandy Hook families. The sale was prompted by Jones’s $1.5 billion liability for falsely claiming the Sandy Hook mass shooting was a hoax.
The proposed acquisition includes Infowars’ website, product inventory, customer lists, social media accounts (including an X account with 638,000 followers), and intellectual property. However, a judge has temporarily halted the sale for review.
X noted in its filing that few bankruptcy courts have previously addressed social media account ownership. The company maintains that regardless of how accounts are used, X Corp. remains their rightful owner, and therefore the bankruptcy trustee cannot sell or transfer what it doesn’t possess.
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This isn’t the first time that Musk has used the platform to further his interests. In October, the company took control of the @America handle for Musk’s Super PAC supporting President-elect Donald Trump.
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