Elon Musk Has A New Reason Why He Shouldn’t Have To Buy Twitter
Elon Musk and his legal team might have found a new reason to back out of the deal for the billionaire to purchase Twitter
This article is more than 2 years old
The Elon Musk and Twitter saga feels like it’s been happening forever at this point and it’s not totally clear there is an end in sight. After the reported richest man in the world made an offer to purchase the social media platform it’s seemingly been all downhill from there and there are potentially more issues on the way. Musk has been looking for ways out of the deal while Twitter very much wants to keep things in place for the billionaire to go through with the purchase. The latter has possibly found a new reason that he should be able to walk away from the deal. And it’s through a former Twitter employee who’s become a whistleblower against the social media company.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Elon Musk and his legal team had put forth another reason to call off the deal and it was because of the allegations former Twitter former head of security Pieter Zatko had made about the company and its dealings. Zatko had spoken with CNN and The Washington Post levying a host of allegations and bringing up different issues having to do with Twitter. These have Musk and his team claiming that the deal can no longer go through. In their letter, Elon Musk’s team said, “The Zatko Complaint alleges far-reaching misconduct at Twitter — all of which was disclosed to Twitter’s directors and senior executives, including (CEO) Parag Agrawal — that is likely to have severe consequences for Twitter’s business…”
According to Zatko, Twitter is dealing with a whole host of issues that would compromise its ability to be viable as a social media platform going forward. The first had to do with potential security vulnerabilities that leave it open to outside threats. Additionally, he’s made the claim that Twitter understands its issues with spam (bot) accounts but has chosen not to employ a better system for managing these. This was a key issue by Elon Musk in wanting to back out of the deal, saying the company hadn’t been forthright about the number of accounts that were actually real people. Additionally, Zatko claimed that the Twitter data centers are at risk which could force more of the company’s activities offline.
And among the bigger claims by Zatko about Twitter, one that must alarm Elon Musk and company if true, is about who is actually on the company’s payroll. In a filing, it was revealed that the US government may have given a tip to Twitter that there could be employees who were working for foreign intelligence agencies.
Elon Musk and his crew are claiming that Twitter was aware of these allegations and chose not to disclose them during the sale process. This has led them to make a move arguing that the original deal was never valid in the first place. Not only would Twitter be in breach of contract, but in fact, it never should have gotten to the point where Musk would have realistically made an offer. It’s a fascinating series of events around this potential purchase but it appears both sides are dug in around what they believe should happen going forward.
