By Rebecca Kern and Eric Geller
09/13/2022 10:15 AM EDT
Updated: 09/13/2022 03:13 PM EDT
Twitter’s protection of users’ sensitive data is so lax that just about anyone with an account has reason to fear for the security of their accounts — even members of the Senate, the company’s former chief security officer told lawmakers Tuesday.
It’s “not far-fetched to say that employees inside the company could take over the accounts of all of the senators in this room,” Peiter “Mudge” Zatko testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee during the latest in a long round of hearings focused on Silicon Valley’s alleged failings.
Zatko, a renowned hacker and former Defense Department employee who has filed whistleblower complaints with several federal agencies and congressional committees, said the failings in cybersecurity practices “would be a goldmine” for foreign governments or intelligence agencies, turning the company’s shortcomings into a potential national security risk.
When he joined the company in late 2020, he said, it was “over a decade behind industry security standards.” He said yes when Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) asked if it’s true that “all of the engineers and half of the employees at Twitter” have access to people’s accounts. Zatko added that he has seen posts on underground forums offering to sell “access to accounts, to delete accounts, to un-ban accounts,” though he didn’t know if they are genuine.
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