Whistleblower accuses Twitter of lackluster security

Peiter Zatko, Twitter’s security chief until he was fired, filed complaints against the company with multiple federal agencies. He said Twitter misled regulators about its cybersecurity defenses, privacy protections, and its fake accounts. Twitter is trying to force Tesla CEO Elon Musk to go through with a $44 billion deal to buy the social media platform. Musk was trying to get out of the deal because he said Twitter was lying to shareholders about its ability to police fake accounts. Zatko also accused the company of violating the terms of a 2011 settlement with the Federal Trade Commission by misrepresenting its ability to protect users’ data.

Who is Zatko? Twitter fired the cybersecurity expert in January for “ineffective leadership and poor performance.” Zatko used to be a hacker and testified before Congress under his handle, “Mudge,” in 1998 about how easy it was to hack the internet. He later held senior positions at the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Google.

Dig deeper: Listen to Mary Reichard’s report on The World and Everything in It podcast about Musk’s vision of social media functioning like a public square.