Twitter whistleblower to give testimony before Senate on September 13th

25 Aug 2022 , 09:13 AM

Peiter “Mudge” Zatko, the former security director of Twitter Inc., will testify before the US Senate Judiciary committee on September 13 to address claims made in his whistleblower complaint that the social media corporation deceived regulators.

According to a spokesperson for Zatko, the senator’s complaint has already been discussed with the staff of the chair and ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and the staff of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Zatko accused Twitter of falsely asserting that it had a strong security plan and making misleading claims about its defenses against hackers and spam accounts.

According to documents provided by congressional investigators, Zatko, a well-known hacker also known as “Mudge,” made a number of allegations and claimed Twitter prioritized user growth over reducing spam. He claimed executives were eligible to receive individual bonuses of up to $10 million linked to increases in daily users but nothing specifically for cutting spam.