Republican presses Twitter chief Elon Musk to higher shield U.S. person information By Reuters

By Diane Bartz

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – High Senate Republican Chuck Grassley urged Elon Musk, who lately acquired Twitter, to conduct a risk evaluation on the social firm to higher shield U.S. person information, following up on considerations raised by a whistleblower.

Hacker Peiter “Mudge” Zatko, a whistleblower who served as Twitter’s head of safety till his firing in January, testified in September that some Twitter workers have been involved the Chinese language authorities would be capable of acquire information on the corporate’s customers.

In a letter to Musk dated Tuesday and launched on Wednesday, Grassley, the highest Republican on the U.S. Judiciary Committee, requested Twitter to carry out a risk evaluation “of Twitter’s present safety posture and programs to higher shield person information and privateness.” He additionally requested for the committee workers to be briefed on the findings.

“Twitter collects huge quantities of knowledge on Americans. Individuals have a vested curiosity in making certain that their personal information is safe, and that the businesses which they’ve

entrusted with their personal information haven’t been infiltrated by international brokers,” Grassley wrote.

Twitter didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.

Zatko testified {that a} international agent might use malware to steal Twitter customers private data, and use that to realize entry to delicate information on the particular person’s telephone, amongst different risks.

The correspondence reiterated some considerations raised in a previous letter despatched by Grassley and Democrat Dick Durbin in September to former chief government Parag Agrawal, who led the corporate till October, when Musk took it over in a $44 billion deal.

In keeping with Grassley, Agrawal didn’t reply to the letter, citing litigation with Musk.