Elon Musk accuses Twitter of covering up security flaws in court filing

In a recent update to the Elon Musk-Twitter saga, the billionaire accused the microblogging site of fraud by “covering up serious flaws” in the company's data security, according to a Thursday court filing. Musk said the latest revelation should in every way prompt him to terminate his $44 billion deal for the company.

Following the claims made by a Twitter whistleblower, Musk amended his previously filed lawsuit, as per a report by Reuters. The whistleblower and former Twitter security head Peiter "Mudge" Zatko, previously claimed that Twitter knowingly allowed the Indian and Chinese governments to place its agents on the company's payroll.  

The Tesla chief said during his testimony before the US Senate Committee that Twitter hid from him that it was not complying with a 2011 agreement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regarding user data. 

Notably, Twitter has come under fire previously for poor security measures. In one such instances happened in 2020, teenage hackers seized control of dozens of high-profile accounts, including the verified profile of former U.S. President Barack Obama. 

In response to Musk's recent allegations, Twitter said it conducted an internal investigation of Zatko's allegations and came to the conclusion that they lacked merit. The company has said Zatko was fired for poor performance. 

Meanwhile, Musk demanded Twitter to make the former head of its consumer division, Kayvon Beykpour, answer questions about spam or robot accounts on the social-media platform that are central to the his legal fight to back out of the buyout, as per a recent Bloomberg report. 

Beykpour, who oversaw more than 230 million Twitter accounts, has so far evaded efforts to make him turn over documents or provide testimony, according to a court filing earlier this week.  

Musk’s legal team says Beykpour is a key figure in their case because he was closely involved with measuring how many were revenue generating accounts. Beykpour’s lawyers told Twitter earlier this month he currently is outside the US and “therefore beyond the subpoena power of the US courts during the pendency” of information exchanges before next month’s trial. 

Nonetheless, last month, Delaware Chancery Court Chancellor Kathaleen S McCormick ordered Twitter to turn over Beykpour’s internal files to Musk’s attorneys. 

Both sides are headed toward a legal battle in a Delaware court on October 17 and Musk has been allowed to use the whistleblower's allegations during the upcoming trial.