FTC May Slap Musk With Billions In Fines For Flouting Twitter Data Rules

Twitter’s privacy and security teams are in turmoil after Elon Musk’s changes to the service bypassed its standard data governance processes.

Photo Insert: The FTC reached a settlement with Twitter in May after the company was caught using personal user info to target ads.

Now, a company lawyer is encouraging employees to seek whistleblower protection “if you feel uncomfortable about anything you’re being asked to do” and warned the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) slap Twitter billions of dollars in fines for flouting data governance rules.

The company’s chief privacy officer Damien Kieran, chief information security officer Lea Kissner, and chief compliance officer Marianne Fogarty have all resigned, according to two employees and an internal message seen by The Verge. Kissner confirmed their departure in a tweet on Thursday.

In a note posted to Twitter’s Slack and viewable to all staff that was obtained by The Verge, an attorney on the company’s privacy team wrote: “Elon has shown that his only priority with Twitter users is how to monetize them. I do not believe he cares about the human rights activists. the dissidents, our users in un-monetizable regions, and all the other users who have made Twitter the global town square you have all spent so long building, and we all love.”

The FTC reached a settlement with Twitter in May after the company was caught using personal user info to target ads. If Twitter doesn’t comply with that agreement, the FTC can issue fines reaching into the billions of dollars, according to the lawyer’s note to employees.

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