Elon Musk is filing another clime to terminate the Twitter deal, based on a complaint filed by whistleblower Peiter Zatko in June. Serious deficiencies in the platform's protection against hackers and privacy concerns mean Twitter has violated the terms of the agreement, the statement said.
Recently, Elon Musk and his team were exposed to yet another reason why his Twitter deal should be terminated. The statements of platform whistleblower Peiter Zatko made significant changes to the course of the case and added even more doubts about its honest work. In a filing on Tuesday, lawyers on behalf of Musk said the allegations by Zatko, including “egregious deficiencies” in the platform’s defenses against hackers and privacy issues, meant that Twitter had breached the conditions in the merger agreement, according to BNN Bloomberg.
Twitter lawyers said in response that the case to terminate the deal is “invalid and wrongful under the agreement.”
Peter Zatko is the former head of security for Twitter. In a statement in June with regulators, including the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) he raised questions about severe shortcomings in the social media company's handling of users' personal data, including running out-of-date software and that executives had withheld information about breaches and lack of protections for user data.
Lawyers for Musk and Twitter previously subpoenaed Zatko to testify. Among other things, he stated that the social media platform officials did not know and did not want to find out how many of the accounts were spambot accounts.
As Jill Fisch, a professor of business law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, noted, any potential impact on the outcome of the trial depends on Zatko's credibility and any new information he may provide, reported S&P Global Market Intelligence.
In this case, Zatko's reputation as a successful hacker and programmer makes him a very serious and respected witness, said Patrick Hall, principal scientist at artificial intelligence-focused law firm bnh.ai and professor of data ethics at The George Washington University.
Before joining Twitter, Zatko made a name for himself as part of the seven-member group of hackers called L0pht who told Congress in 1998 that they could shut down the Internet in as little as 30 minutes. Zatko later went on to work for the Defense Department's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and then Alphabet Inc.'s Google LLC.
“Zatko is a legend in the computer security world,” Hall said. “He also has some experience in these types of high-profile situations.”
© 2022, Eva Fox | Tesmanian. All rights reserved.
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About the Author
Eva Fox
Eva Fox joined Tesmanian in 2019 to cover breaking news as an automotive journalist. The main topics that she covers are clean energy and electric vehicles. As a journalist, Eva is specialized in Tesla and topics related to the work and development of the company.
