For years, journalists have written about contributions to social media of government employees to help reveal the positions, motivation and events of public officials.
However, when the journalist recently trained the same lens on Elon Musk’s new program, the billionaire suggested that the news be illegal and join other powerful data associated with Trump’s administration that has made similar demands in recent weeks.
They say, as they say, Doxxing: Publishing private information about someone with a harmful intention. The term concerns the tactics of revenge, originally used by hackers, to bully, harass or intimidate people online and can encourage third parties to commit violent acts.
This month, Mr. Musk and the next month expanded the definition and applied it to journalists and others who tried to bear the government with a responsible report on public information. One official of the Ministry of Justice, appointed by President Trump, said at the beginning of last week that he found that a law that broke from people who “focused” the employees of the government’s effective program Mr. Musk.
Although the official did not name names, civil freedom and group of freedom of speech stated that his comments seemed to refer to several journalists who recently revealed new details of Mr. Musk’s efforts, including the identification of some people who work for him. These advocates argue that the first amendment explicitly protects the type of job reporters and that government employees are not protected from a critical investigation by definition.
Instead, they say that Mr. Musk and others are trying to intimidate and cool the media at a major moment.
The “Doxxing” has happened since its origin, which means that someone on the Internet has published something I would rather not see, “said Will Creeley, Legal Director for individual rights and statements, the most famous group of freedom as the most famous as fire. “But if living in the US in 2025 means you can expect criminal investigations for government criticism, we are all in many problems.”
In recent weeks, political law has increasingly increased the attack on the mainstream journalists. From his inauguration Mr. Trump has intensified the false claims that the government secretly financed News including Politico and calls “the biggest scandal of all” while it is time to appoint specific journalists and Call to be released.
Federal Communication Commission also opened an investigation by PBS and NPR and investigates handling with CBS News “60 minutes” Interview with Kamal Harris Last autumn, which is the subject of an action filed by Mr. Trump. Trump’s administration also recently gave space in the Pentagon dedicated to several large media organizations, including The New York Times and Washington Post, On real pickled sales such as Breitbart News and One America News Network.
The White House spokesman did not respond to the request for a comment. Mr. Musk did not answer the e -mail with the search for comments.
Ed Martin, a temporary American representative for Columbia district, who has published public threats to prosecute those who interfere with Mr. Musk’s work, is now asking Mr. Creey and almost thirty other organizations, explaining what laws they believe and investigating. In a letter last weekThe organizations stated that any attempts to account for reporters or media in this context would be unethical, illegal and violate the institute.
There is no federal law on antidoxxing, But over a dozen states adopted laws Protect people from doxxed. Some of these laws are adapted to apply only to some public officials, such as police officers, public health officials or judges.
Mr. Martin’s statement followed new reports on the so -called Ministry of Efficiency of the Government or Doga, a group headed by Mr. Musk, who is charged with the reform of the federal government.
The first of these messages, Posted 2 February Wired, named Six of the recent Rent of the Ministry whose identities were not previously public.
The next day Mr. Musk X, his social media platform, took to answer an anonymous account that shared the names of these employees.
“You have forgotten the crime,” Mr. Musk wrote. The account was subsequently suspended, which caused the post to disappear from the platform.
Charlie Kirk, co -founder of the right -wing activist group, soon after he directly accused Wired of “Doxxing Doga employee”, in his contribution of 4.6 million followers in X. Then Mr. Martin published a letter about the main head of justice, Mr. Musk’s labeling and said: “We will not tolerate threats against Dogo’s workers or violating the rights of dissatisfied.”
A few days later, Katherine Long, a reporter in Wall Street Journal, wrote an article that states that Marko Enez25, a DOGE employee, who was awarded access to the Ministry of Finance’s payment system, published racist comments on the social media account in the past. In response to Mrs Long’s questions with the White House, Mr. Elez resigned.
This triggered a number of Mr. Musk’s attacks on X, who claimed that the reporter was a “disgusting and cruel person” who “was to be released immediately” and added that her actions were “certainly inappropriate, perhaps criminal”.
A few hours later, Mr. Martin published a second letter to Mr. Muska and thanked him for “the recommendation of several individuals and networks that seem to be stealing government assets and/or threatening government employees”.
Wired said that the Ministry of Justice was not contacted. Katie Drummond, the Global Editorial Director of Outlet, said in her statement that “our coverage speaks for itself. It is strictly reported and controlled by facts. ”
Wall Street Journal did not respond to the request for comment.
Since then, Mrs Long has become the aim of a massive swelling online abuse and criticism. The prominent manager of the Hedge Fund Bill Ackman called her in a post that contained her contact information, called a “bad, unethical liar”. Last year, In an article for business initiatesMrs Long announced that Mr. Ackman’s wife, Neri Oxman, seemed to be the plagial parts of her dissertation.
At the weekend he wrote a right -wing influence from Britain a critical article about Mrs. Long, who described her as “fanatical” and suggested that she could be a secret federal agent because she had an internship of the Foreign Ministry more than ten years ago and worked for USAIDs in Tajikistan in year 2016.
Vice President JD also suggested in paper X on X that Mrs. Long tried to “destroy people” with her work.
Danielle Citron, Professor of Law to the University of Virginia, who specializes in online privacy, said she was ironic, that Mrs Long was subjected to online harassment by the same people who called Foul.
“This is the case” privacy for me, but not for you, “Mrs. Lemon said.
She and others also said that despite their recent outrage at what they had called doxxing, Mr. Musk and others have a long history of public trip with Trump’s administration.
In October, for example, a group funded by the Heritage Foundation, a non -profit organization included in Trump behind the 2025 project, the right -wing plan for the Republican administration, published the names of 10 little known employees of the Ministry of Internal Security and called the callers “most subversive users in America. he has published names Of the more than 50 other low -profiles of federal employees as part of what he calls “dei tracking list”.
And at the end of November, Mr. Musk intensified posts on x named four federal employees working on climate change issuesIt leads at least one of them to remove their social media accounts.
