The Federal Trade Commission is asking Twitter to turn over internal communications related to its owner, Elon Musk, as well as detailed information about layoffs and identifying the names of journalists granted access to the tweeters’ information.
FOMC guidance documents showed 12 messages to Twitter since Musk’s acquisition of the platform, demanding that it identify all journalists who were granted access to the company’s records and provide information about the launch of the revamped blue-tag service, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The documents also showed that an official in the committee sent a letter to Musk’s lawyer on November 10 (2022), after the first wave of layoffs, in which he expressed concern about the impact on Twitter’s ability to protect user information.
Twitter dodging
Wall Street obtained the so-called demand letters from the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, excerpts of which were published Tuesday in the task force’s report on the FTC investigation.
The letters indicated that Twitter had responded to the FTC, but that the agency felt, as of late January, that the company was engaging in a “disturbing pattern of persistent delays” that raised “serious concerns about its compliance.”
In turn, Douglas Farrar, a spokesman for the Federal Trade Commission, said, “Protecting users’ privacy is exactly what the FTC is supposed to do.”
Twitter Reuters
He added that the agency “is conducting a rigorous investigation of Twitter’s compliance with the consent order that went into effect long before Musk purchased the company.”
He also noted that the commission routinely sought information about companies providing information to third parties, including journalists, on the principle that a company could not withhold the same information from the trade commission.
Elon Musk (Reuters)
Federal.
A judicial committee disagrees
On the other hand, the Judiciary Committee report accused the Federal Trade Commission of exceeding its authority, and said that “there is no logical reason to request knowledge of the identities of journalists who deal with Twitter.”
On Dec. 13, the FTC asked about Twitter’s decision to give journalists access to internal company communications, a project Musk has called “Twitter Files” and which he says sheds light on controversial decisions made by the previous administration.
The agency asked Twitter to describe “the nature of the access granted to each person” and how allowing such access “is consistent with its privacy and information security obligations under the order.”
I also asked if Twitter did background checks on the journalists, and if they had access to the personal messages of Twitter users.
It is indicated that if the FTC concludes that Twitter violated the 2022 order, the agency may request financial penalties, trade restrictions, or penalties on responsible executives.
