Cyber security

Experts alarmed: Musk authority “hacks America”

"In the space of a few weeks, the US government has experienced perhaps the most consequential security breach in its history," write Bruce Schneier from Harvard University and security expert Davi Ottenheimer.

(Bild: AFP/AFP or licensors)

Computer experts and privacy advocates are sounding the alarm: according to their assessment, the access to government servers by presidential advisor Elon Musk and his team threatens the cyber security of the USA. Inexperienced outsiders now have access to the country's most sensitive and complex systems. According to the experts, this also increases the risk of cyberattacks by foreign intelligence services.

Since US President Donald Trump took office, dozens of young computer scientists from Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) have been scouring the databases of government departments and agencies to identify potential cost-cutting opportunities.

Many are tech professionals in their twenties from the multi-billionaire's companies who have no experience with the government apparatus and have not had to undergo the usual security checks. There are also concerns about Musk himself that he could gain business advantages by gaining access to the sensitive data.

"The most serious breach"
Doge's campaign began at the Treasury Department, where Musk's force gained access to the US government's payment system. This was justified by the need to monitor public spending. The software engineers then targeted the federal authorities in order to control the computer systems there too. They intervened in the Ministry of Education and the GSA administrative agency; they completely paralyzed the USAID development aid agency.

"In the space of a few weeks, the US government has experienced perhaps the most serious security breach in its history," write Bruce Schneier from Harvard University and security expert Davi Ottenheimer in Foreign Policy magazine. "Doge hacks America" was the headline of their article.

While they gained access to the computers themselves, Doge's team locked out senior government employees with decades of expertise - in other words, those with intimate knowledge of the system's complicated vulnerabilities. This is also a cause for concern, and the consequences are already becoming apparent.

"No one is allowed to control them alone"
There have been reports from the government's human resources department that Doge employees connected an unauthorized server to the network and allowed AI software to access the personal data of US citizens, in violation of federal privacy laws. Dozens of former government employees filed lawsuits. They accuse Musk and his team of illegally gaining access to confidential data of US citizens.

Security experts Schneier and Ottenheimer are particularly concerned about the dismissal of officials who were responsible for the security measures. "The Treasury Department's computer systems have such a great impact on national security that they were designed on the same principle that underlies nuclear weapons use protocols: No one person may control them alone," they write. "Just as it takes two authorized representatives to 'trigger the launch of a nuclear missile,' altering essential financial systems requires the involvement of multiple accredited individuals."

Danger from outside
Security experts also fear that Musk's team's interventions in the computer systems will facilitate hacker attacks from outside. "The Chinese, the Russians and other intelligence agencies are putting their best teams on projects that target the US government," says former White House cybersecurity coordinator under President Barack Obama, Michael Daniel. "And they will take advantage of any opportunity that presents itself."

"If you don't put cybersecurity first at every step, you may be opening the door to foreign intelligence agencies and cybercriminals," warns former FBI agent and cybersecurity expert Eric O'Neill. Errors and security gaps produced by Musk's young IT team in one afternoon could be misused as a weapon by the enemies of the USA for years to come.