Elon Musk’s active actors have received unprecedented access to a group of US government departments – including agencies responsible for data management for millions of federal employees and a system that deals with 6 trillion dollars of payments for Americans.
During the past two weeks, the group of actors has taken control of Musk – a presidential consulting council within the Trump administration known as the Ministry of Governmental efficiency, or Doug – on federal departments and data groups, despite their questions about their security permits, cybersecurity practices and legitimacy of musk activities.
Whether it is an achievement or a coup – which completely depends on your point of view – a small group of Most of them are young people of the private sector From Musk and its partners – many have any previous government experience – they can now see, and in some cases, they control the most sensitive federal government data for millions of Americans and the nearest country allies.
The access achieved by the Musk’s Doge team is the widest compromise known for the federal government-controlled data by a special group of individuals-and I have never reached their way.
Dog acknowledged some details about her continuous activities. I left this task to the media, which reported doubtful cybersecurity and collapsing in the long -term cybersecurity standards that risk the government’s sensitive data from reaching it by the neglotes.
Many Dog’s works are to avoid censorship and transparency, and leave open questions whether cybersecurity and privacy practices are followed. It is not clear whether DOGE employees are following the procedures to prevent these data from accessing them by other people, or if any other steps are taken to protect sensitive data on Americans.
So far, evidence indicates that security is not at the top of the mind.
For example, it is said that a Doj employee Use a personal Gmail account to reach a government call; And present it recently A lawsuit by federal violations Doug’s claims were ordered to connect an unauthorized email server to the government network in violation of the Federal Privacy Law.
Whether DOGE employees are bad actors who miss part of this point. Deception, espionage or ignorance can produce the same optimal result: exposure or loss of sensitive data groups in the country.
Currently, it is worth seeing how we get here.
Double security permits
The ease that Dog seized on the departments and its wide shops from American data has taken US job officials and legislators, who continue to request answers from the Trump administration.
The efforts made by Musk to control the country’s databases in the country, caused anxiety from the Spring security professionals, some of whom spent their professional life in the government dedicated to securing the most sensitive systems and data for the Americans.
Questions about the level of security permit that DOGE employees and whether temporary security clearance gives them the authority to demand access to restricted federal regulations. When returning to his position, Trump The executive order signed Allowing the administration officials to grant the “upper secret” and the divided security clearance of individuals on a temporary basis with a little large examination, which is a sharp departure from the long protocols.
The confusion about DOGE’s permits has led to short confrontations between many job officials in federal administrations in recent days. At the United States Agency for International Development, or the United States Agency for International Development, senior officials were placed on leave after standing on the way to Doug employees to protect classified information, According to Associated Press. Dog was later access to the American -classified facility for International Development, which has been reported to contain intelligence reports.
Katie Miller, Dog Adviser, said in Posted on X No material classified by Dog “without appropriate security permits” has been accessed, despite the details of the team’s statement It is still not specifiedIncluding the number of people who obtained temporary secret permits.
numerous Senior legislators of the Senate Intelligence Committee He said Wednesday that they are still looking for answers about Dog and what clearance that its members possess.
“No information has been provided to Congress or the public about who was officially appointed under Duwaj, according to the authority or the regulations that do Dog, or how Dog is examining and monitoring its employees and representatives before providing an uninterrupted access to the apparently classified materials and the books of the Senate.
Dog’s seizure of the government
Within a week of President Trump’s inauguration – and Its executive order creates Doge Musk staff began to infiltrate a variety of federal agencies. Sensitive payments systems in the US Treasury, which contained personal information for millions of Americans receiving payments from the government, were from the tax recovered amounts to social security checks, from the first.
Doug also has I gained access To the Personal Administration Office, the Ministry of Human Resources of the government that includes databases on personal information for all federal workers, and the United States of America, which is He has data Applicants who have applied for a federal job.
OPM officials said they have no vision or supervision of the Musk team’s access to its systems. They told Reuters: “It creates true cybersecurity and the effects of piracy,” they told Reuters.
Dog’s activity led to widespread opposition, including some Republicans.
Senator Ron Widan, who is a major democratic committee on the Senate Finance Committee, described Musk to the sensitive federal payments systems to the dangers of national security, given the conflict of interests on its wide commercial operations in China. A group of senior Democrats said In a later message to the cabinet This Dog’s access to sensitive government data “can harm unorganized national security.”
In a post on Bluezki, Stewart Stevens, the previous republican strategy Call the acquisition Among the treasury systems as “the most important data leakage in the history of the Internet”, adding: “Ordinary individuals in data work now have access to your social security information.”
Cabinet She defended her transfer to grant access to sensitive payment systems to the administrationEmphasizing in a response not to the democratic lawmakers that the Musk Doge team can access the treasury banks from personal information about the Americans. The message confirms Tom Crawr, CEO Group of cloud softwareThat has Citrix and many other technology companies, is now a cabinet employee. Krause did not return a request to comment.
Dog has since managed to reach multiple sensitive internal systems in the Ministry of Education, including data groups It contains personal information about millions of students registered in financial aid. Doug staff also A student “access to all” small business management systemsIncluding contracts, payments and human resources information.
Musk team According to what was reported, he can reach To the payment systems within the US Department of Health and Humanitarian Services, and Access to data In the American agency that manages medical and medical care. Dog is also Access to employee systems In the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Department, or NOAA, and Plan to reach the systems In the Ministry of Transport.
Local and international repercussions
There are indescribable security risks that come from granting access to the essence of the internal data of the United States government to a group of unacceptable individuals and individuals who suffer from a false examination.
For example, but not limited to, it can control some things that may be mistaken: access to the government network can from a non -approved computer that houses harmful programs to waive other devices on the federal network, and allow the stealing of sensitive government information, regardless of whether it is classified. It puts poor personal information on cloud devices or environments that did not meet the most important specifications of the government, or use the most powerful safety control elements, that data exposed to the risk of concession or leakage.
These are not likely scenarios. These types of violations occur all the time.
Last year, he alone witnessed some of the largest data violations in the history caused by the harmful access obtained through the personal devices of the company’s employees, who have confused harmful programs by mistake by downloading harmful programs. Any compromise of the team’s adoption or access data, or any incorrect processing of sensitive databases may lead to the loss of sensitive or bad government data.
Perhaps the most anxious is a dog, and its activities, operating outside the general audit.
It is said that officials and legislators assigned to government supervision are not an insight into the data that Dogs enables to reach within the government, or what are the controls or protection of cybersecurity – if any. The departments professionals who have spent a lot of their career can not protect access to the data stored in these systems to do a lot, but they stand and see as individuals who do not have a somewhat few government experience, who have experienced the most sensitive data groups.
Technology and Privacy Lawyer Cathy Gillis, Writing in TechdirtMusk and its DOGE team probably argue “a personal official” under the US Federal Piracy Law, known as the Fraud and Mismanage on Computer, which covers access to federal systems without appropriate permission. Gillis ultimately wrote, in the end, Dog’s activity should be determined as “unauthorized arrival” and therefore illegal.
There is also a question of how the US governments respond to the United States to calculate the data of its inhabitants at the federal level. American states have data breach laws that require the protection of their citizens’ data, even if the federal government is not. Whether the Musk team arrives at federal systems raises legal procedures from the states or not.
It also puts relations with the United States and its diplomatic allies on a shaky land. Allied nations You may not want to share intelligence information with the United States government If they believe that information can leak, spill in the public domain, or be lost in another way as a result of the collapse of cybersecurity practices that aim to protect sensitive information.
Indeed, the consequences of cybersecurity may not be the continuous access to Dog to federal departments and data groups known for some time.
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