Judge Rejects Elon Musk's Lawsuit To Obtain Twitter User Detail Data

Judge rejects Elon Musk's request for details of Twitter user data. (photo: twitter @elonmusk)

JAKARTA - Elon Musk's claim for details of Twitter Inc's users was dismissed by a judge as "grossly absurd" on Thursday, August 25 even though the billionaire will get some data as he pursues his bid to end the company's $44 billion acquisition.

Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of Delaware's Court of Chancery said many of Musk's data demands were "grossly absurd," totaling trillions of data points that "no person in their right mind has ever attempted such an attempt."

The judge said Musk, Tesla Inc's chief executive, already had the data and documents needed to proceed with his case, many of which were provided before he said on July 8 that he was ending the deal in part because Twitter was withholding information. .

"My overall impression is that the plaintiffs have agreed to provide the defendants with a significant amount of information, and that the plaintiffs have agreed to produce information sufficiently broad to meet most of the plaintiffs' obligations," wrote Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of Delaware's Court of Chancery. .

Twitter was ordered to submit data from 9,000 sample accounts in a fourth-quarter audit to estimate the number of spam or bot users on the social media platform.

Twitter has said the data no longer exists and it would be burdensome to recreate it, even though McCormick gave the company two weeks to produce it.

"We look forward to reviewing the data that Twitter has been hiding for months," Musk's attorney, Alex Spiro, said in an emailed statement.

Musk, the world's richest man, said he wanted to test the accuracy of the audit because he believed the company misinterpreted that only 5% of his accounts were spam. He wanted McCormick to decide he could end the deal with Twitter.

Instead Twitter wants McCormick to order Musk to close the deal at an agreed price of $54.20 per share. Twitter shares were up about 1% after the verdict and ended up 0.6% at $41.05.

Twitter said at a court hearing Wednesday that Musk's focus on spam was "legally irrelevant" because the company had described the amount of spam in regulatory filings as an estimate, not a representation. He also said the true rate of spam could be higher.