Bea Beltran Tech 09.28.2022 02:Sep AM EDT

Elon Musk, Twitter’s Legal Battle Now Involve Signal Messages

The issue between Twitter and Elon Musk has been a fat vein for meme content. The legal battle has been causing trouble for both parties, and yet again, another one is at hand.

The lawyers of Twitter and the CEO of Tesla Motors battled it out again in Delaware's Court of Chancery. Although, the trial that will hold the final decision will be held on October 17th.

The hearing lasted for more than three hours, discussing Elon Musk's use of an encrypted messaging app, Signal. As stated by Engadget, Twitter lawyers claimed that Elon Musk is withholding messages using the app, which has a feature that immediately deletes messages.

Twitter's side has cited a screenshot of a conversation between Musk and the managing director of the tech billionaire's family office.

Why Is The Conversation on Signal Such a Big Deal?

Twitter's lawyers claimed that the message mentioned Morgan Stanley, a financial services company, and Marc Andreesen, an investor and software engineer. There were also talks about a conversation concerning EU regulatory approval.

The discovery of the screenshot became more damning since Musk and Birchall claimed beforehand that they did not use the Signal app to talk about the deal.

Musk defended himself by saying that there was no proof that they destroyed evidence. This was in response to Twitter lawyers saying that there was a missing text message between Elon Musk and Oracle Chairman, also a co-investor in the Twitter deal, Larry Ellison.

In regards to the implication that they were conducting shady conversations in the Signal app, Musk's lawyers cited that Jack Dorsey, the former CEO of Twitter, had a conversation with board chair Bret Taylor in the Signal app.

How Did All of This Even Start?

On April 25th, Musk was officially acquiring Twitter for $44 billion. Twitter's board of directors has accepted the deal. Once the transaction is complete, Twitter will become a private company.

The deal hit a bit of a snag, and Elon Musk tweeted that the deal was on hold. It was due to the fact that the CEO of Twitter publicly refused to show proof that the social media platform had less than five-percent spam or fake accounts.

Elon musk mentioned that his offer was based on Twitter SEC fillings being accurate, and their failure to provide legitimate data did not fit into that description. The Verge stated that if Elon Musk wanted a way out of the deal, this was the key to it.

The tech billionaire started showing his doubts through tweets claiming that Twitter was actively withholding the information that he was asking for and said that it was a breach of contract.

Weeks after his announcement of his plans to acquireTwitter, he has officially backed out due to Twitter making false and misleading statements during negotiations. It did not help that Twitter refused to provide data in regard to the number of spam accounts.

The legal battle was then initiated by Twitter by suing Musk for attempting to bail on the deal. Since this, Elon Musk and Twitter have been battling it outm and the final outcome will be determined after the five-day trial in October.