Elon Musk’s Twitter problems are multiplying

Elon Musk’s Twitter-related headaches multiplied this Tuesday, with the US Federal Trade Commission (The FTC) widening the investigation into the company’s handling of user data.

Musk found time to spar publicly with an investor in Tesla Inc. The electric car company he runs has chided Musk over his involvement with Twitter.

On top of those legal developments, the billionaire executive is engaged in a potentially protracted search for a new chief executive officer or CEO for the social network, a position he has said no one really wants. Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter Inc. has been weighing on the shares of Tesla and sapping his wealth, knocking him down from his seat as the world’s richest person. He conducted a Twitter poll asking users whether he should step down as the head of the company an issue which met with a resounding yes — he’s actively looking for a possible replacement, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

The FTC investigation

The federal agency is deepening an investigation into Twitter’s privacy and data security practices in the wake of Musk’s takeover.

FTC lawyers questioned two former senior executives in the past month about whether Twitter has been able to comply with the agency’s 2011 consent order since Musk took over, said three people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named discussing a confidential investigation.

The two former executives questioned by the FTC were Damien Kieran, Twitter’s former chief privacy officer, and Lea Kissner, the most senior cybersecurity officer. Kieran and Kissner both quit Twitter, alongside the head of compliance.

The FTC had already opened a new inquiry into Twitter after the company’s former chief cybersecurity officer, Peiter Zatko, testified in Congress in September, alleging the platform was a “ticking bomb of security vulnerabilities.”

Parting ways

Musk’s Twitter also parted ways with Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, the law firm that formerly represented the company before the FTC and negotiated both the 2011 consent decree and the terms of a related May settlement over a breach of that agreement. Roughly 5,000 of Twitter’s 7,500 employees have left the company since Musk assumed control, including the general counsel and chief privacy officer.