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Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

krebsonsecurity.com

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Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#411

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 »

adgjlsfhk1 wrote: post #389
bad_username wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> all usual controls were bypassed and the DOGE people had very low level access to systems Before DOGE, somebody obviously had to have this access as well, and similarly could have copied and stored. Why be concerned with DOGE but not their predecessors? Honest question.

Because before the people that had access to this data got that access after passing background checks, had years in the treasury, supervision from higher-ups, and other processes in place. Now it's being accessed by cyber-criminal Nazis in their 20s who describe themselves as wanting to "Normalize Indian hate", " want a eugenic immigration policy", and who "were racist before it was cool" https://www.npr.org/2025/02…

Hmm. I am hesitant to engage this post, but it may be well worth to point out, that some of issues with status quo are precisely the result of "people that had access to this data got that access after passing background checks, had years in the treasury, supervision from higher-ups, and other processes in place". Until now it was old boys club that did not dare to shake things up a little.

My point is that there is plenty to dislike here, but if your argument against him is: he is a nazi, you have already lost, because you do not understand the sentiment out there.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#412

Post by stanislavb »

The sad part is that a lot of people here are complicit, too. I'm sorry, but that's the truth. So many were either brainwashed or put to believe that Kamala is bad ... as bad as Trump. So many in the US showed inaction. You couldn't vote for the "lesser evil" and were happy to let the real evil in the house instead. And now it seems too late. It might be too late. I would bet money that the US won't be able to get rid of these new parasites in the White House for many years. And even after that, it will take generations for the US to gain the trust of its partners and the world. Because trust that's once lost is very difficult to regain.

It seems that at this point, it might be better to "simply" accept the new imperator(s) and learn to live with them and their new rules. And remember, they are NOT breaking the law, they are bending "rules" for the good of humanity... (yeah... nah). They have never tried and will never try to enrich themselves for the sake of their egos.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#413

Post by acdha »

bad_username wrote: post #382
fabian2k wrote: post #47

Ignoring the horrifying political parts, I think one aspect here about data access that is inherently worrying is that it seems like all usual controls were bypassed and the DOGE people had very low level access to systems. So there are probably copies of sensitive data now in their possession, and nobody knows exactly what was copied and where it is stored. This kind of access would be dangerous even in the hands of…

> all usual controls were bypassed and the DOGE people had very low level access to systems Before DOGE, somebody obviously had to have this access as well, and similarly could have copied and stored. Why be concerned with DOGE but not their predecessors? Honest question.

Here’s how that sounds to anyone with security experience: “Before the bank president gave his nephew the vault keys, somebody must have had access as well.”

Federal IT has tons of policies designed to prevent unauthorized access and mistakes. People go through background checks, they only work on secured networks using official devices, everything is logged and audited, and circumventing it is a crime with penalties potentially leading to jail time. Some of those policies have strong legal requirements for oversight: even if you’re not doing anything other than your job, the agency needs to be able to show how work is done to auditors, Congress, FOIA requests, etc. Anything with national security implications should be designed to avoid a single compromised person from being able to avoid detection, too, especially for people trusted with administrative access to IT systems.

These guys are widely reported to be using personal emails and devices (violating the record and transparency laws) and even if they’re acting entirely in good faith they are bypassing policies designed to contain the damage due to mistakes. For example, what happens if one of them gets an email with an attachment claiming to have evidence of politically incorrect activities and runs the payload on a device/network which has had safeguards removed by executive fiat?

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#414

Post by dashundchen »

purplethinking wrote: post #276
malkia wrote: post #262

[flagged]

[flagged]

If there is waste, then the proper channel to address is through Congress which controls the budget. The executive is not a dictator and cannot impound or dissolve congressionally appropriated funds.

The GOP controls both houses and could easily do this if they were so convinced. Instead they're laser focused on cutting taxes on billionaires to the tune of $4 trillion dollars

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#415

Post by throwaway292910 »

whatshisface wrote: post #165

Why isn't all government budgetary information public to begin with?

Public information can't be made more public when it is already public. Congress passes the federal budget, which is public. Contracts are public. Bid processes are public. The only exceptions are things that are considered PII and things that are classified.

USAspending.gov contains public spending data thanks to the bipartisan bill Obama, Coburn, McCain, and Carper passed two decades ago. It's one of many places to start.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#416

Post by dang »

ebcode wrote: post #395
dang wrote: post #684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent all day responding to the replies here, and then detaching them in order to save space at the top of the thread. But I just had a better idea. This is a stub comment so we have a single root to collapse the replies. This way (1) replies can stay close to their parent (the top comment) without flooding the screen with offtopicness; and (2) we can all re-experience the timeless truth of https://en.wikipedia.org…

Thank you, dang. I think you've done the right thing here, and I'm sure you're also under a lot of stress right now. Thanks for having faith in the community to discuss this amicably.

Thank you!

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#417

Post by dang »

nailer wrote: post #401
dang wrote: post #684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent all day responding to the replies here, and then detaching them in order to save space at the top of the thread. But I just had a better idea. This is a stub comment so we have a single root to collapse the replies. This way (1) replies can stay close to their parent (the top comment) without flooding the screen with offtopicness; and (2) we can all re-experience the timeless truth of https://en.wikipedia.org…

You should leave the flags, for the same reasons as last time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42933391

I hear you but I think this sequence of stories has interest to HN readers on both sides of the political abyss, though not necessarily for the same reasons, and I think one can find the stories interesting without crossing into personal attack. (It's true that some of the articles do that more than others.)

We don't want too much of this, but a certain amount is ok, and that's how HN has operated for at least the last 15 years.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#418

Post by frogperson »

libertarian1 wrote: post #43
ty6853 wrote: post #38

A career fed guy in his 50s being forced to beg for his job in a 15 minute teleconference to an arrogant zoomer in shorts and an unbuttoned suit is peak representation of democracy.

this '50 yo fed guy' is a parasite if he cannot justify his work for the nation. 'arrogant zoomer' lmao

20 year old are dumb as shit, you couldn't explain anything to me when I was 20 because I already knew everything.

A subject matter expert in some obscure government office might not be able to dumb it down well enough in 15 minutes especially if they have no idea who their audience is ahead of time.

Have some empathy.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#419

Post by mistrial9 »

Waterluvian wrote: post #238

Of all the ways for China, Russia, Iran, Israel, etc. to get access to sensitive data like this, these events feel like they’re by a wide margin the most likely way for them to do so. These people are going to cut corners and be sloppy and stuff is just going to end up on USB keys and whatnot.

but isn't this three more stages past that, already? Isn't it that Equifax and US Security Clearance System and the private secure Phone System for Senators and a long list of other things already cracked wide open? Because loyal DC bureaucrats with zero coding IT skills, sub-sub-sub contracted the real work then swapped contractors ump-teen times already, with the resulting systems all "super extra secret" black box except the right checks come out without fail?

On the extreme other hand, motivated World's Richest Man gets the inner keys in two weeks to all DC payment process flows ?

Make no mistake, this is disaster in the making, and lets get some details in the sunlight IMHO. but it seems laughable to claim that "China might get more info" when China (and a few others) already have been shown to run circles around core DC IT.

Re: Teen on Musk's DOGE team graduated from 'The Com'

#420

Post by hi_hi »

9283409232 wrote: post #106

The question no one asking is why Elon is sending a team of teenage programmers and not a team of financial auditors if he really wanted to cut government spending?

I don't quite understand how they are gaining the access credentials required? Where I work, it takes days to onboard people, through standard processes. Whats happening in this case.

Given the highly volatile, and legally gray, situation; I'd expect the front line people who usually grant access are at least flagging these requests to their boss, who flags to their boss etc. Is everyone up the chain just giving a shrug and saying "seems legit, give them the access".

Of course people don't want to loose their jobs, but I would have expected someone in a senior leadership position to take a stand in preventing this (unless their all on board?)

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