Elon Musk is gonna be happy to hear this:
Remember, even if you don't use Twitter (and good for you), it's used as the global soundboard for politicians and public figures to launder their ideas through the journalism class and digital gatekeepers that control the flow of information.
If Twitter says something is true and powerful politicians and their media pals agree, then dissent is shut down and shadow banned.
Because of that, the company is crucial in the 21st-Century conversation about free speech.
More from the AP:
Peiter "Mudge" Zatko, a respected cybersecurity expert, appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to lay out his allegations.
"Twitter's misleading the public, lawmakers" and regulators, Zatko said as he began his sworn testimony.
"They don't know what data they have, where it lives and where it came from and so, unsurprisingly, they can't protect it," Zatko said. "It doesn't matter who has keys if there are no locks."
Zatko said "Twitter leadership ignored its engineers," in part because "their executive incentives led them to prioritize profit over security." His message echoed one brought to Congress against another social media giant last year, but unlike that Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, Zatko hasn't brought troves of internal documents to back up his claims.
Zatko was the head of security for the influential platform until he was fired early this year. He filed a whistleblower complaint in July with Congress, the Justice Department, the Federal Trade Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Among his most serious accusations is that Twitter violated the terms of a 2011 FTC settlement by falsely claiming that it had put stronger measures in place to protect the security and privacy of its users.
Elon Musk is refusing to buy Twitter on the grounds that it lied about its reach, protocols, and the number of bots on its platform (artificial accounts used to sway public opinion and inflate follower counts to give more visibility to preferred people).
Twitter has sued the billionaire over his withdrawal from the purchase deal, forcing the matter to court.
Keep that popcorn handy, folks!
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