September 13, 2022 – Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal has been questioned by US lawmakers about the company’s security practices in connection with the explosive revelations made last month by a whistleblower, who is set to testify before Congress.
Leading members of the Senate Judiciary Committee sent Agrawal a series of questions on Monday regarding the vulnerabilities in Twitter’s security infrastructure that former security chief and whistleblower, Peiter Zetko, highlighted in his complaint, which was first published by The Washington Post and CNN on August 23. The complaint had been filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in July.
The lawmakers have sought answers regarding how Twitter protects personal user data, how it deals with internal threats and foreign intelligence operatives, and Zatko’s allegations that the company deliberately misled the regulators about the protection of users’ privacy on the social networking platform.
According to Zatko’s complaint, Twitter was also forced by the Indian government to employ one of its agents who, owing to basic security flaws in the social networking platform, would have access to vast amounts of sensitive user data.
The complaint accused Twitter executives of violating the company’s commitments to its users by knowingly granting an Indian government agent access to the company’s internal user data and information systems. The claim sparked a wave of concern in Pakistan, with the Foreign Office releasing a statement.
Zatko’s complaint included accusations of Twitter’s failure to prioritise the removal of spam or bot accounts as well.
Twitter, however, rejected Zatko’s claims, and responded by saying that he had been fired from the company in January for “ineffective leadership and poor performance”.
According to reports, Agrawal was also invited for the congressional hearing alongside Zatko, but Twitter reportedly declined the invitation.
