FTC watching Twitter security execs exits with 'deep concern' - Reuters

Nov 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said connected Thursday it was watching Twitter with "deep concern" aft the societal media platform's apical privateness and compliance officers quit, perchance putting it astatine hazard of violating regulatory orders.

The company's main information serviceman Lea Kissner connected Thursday successful a tweet said that she quit. Chief Privacy Officer Damien Kieran and Chief Compliance Officer Marianne Fogarty person besides resigned, according to an interior connection seen by Reuters.

The departures travel aft the platform's caller owner, billionaire Elon Musk, moved swiftly to clean house aft taking over Twitter for $44 cardinal connected Oct. 27. He announced plans to cut half its workforce past week, promised to halt fake accounts and is charging $8 a period for the Twitter Blue work that volition see a bluish cheque verification.

"We are tracking caller developments astatine Twitter with heavy concern," Douglas Farrar, the FTC's manager of nationalist affairs, told Reuters.

"No CEO oregon institution is supra the law, and companies indispensable travel our consent decrees. Our revised consent bid gives america caller tools to guarantee compliance, and we are prepared to usage them," Farrar said.

In May, Twitter agreed to wage $150 cardinal to settee allegations by the FTC it misused backstage information, similar telephone numbers, to people advertizing to users aft telling them the accusation was collected lone for information reasons.

An lawyer connected Twitter's privateness squad reported the enforcement departures successful a enactment seen by Reuters and posted to Twitter's Slack messaging strategy connected Thursday.

In the note, the lawyer mentioned proceeding Twitter's ineligible main Alex Spiro accidental that Musk was consenting to instrumentality a "huge magnitude of risk" with Twitter. "Elon puts rockets into space, he's not acrophobic of the FTC," the lawyer quoted Spiro arsenic saying.

Twitter did not respond to a petition for remark connected the FTC warning, the enactment from the lawyer oregon the departures. Spiro did not instantly respond to a petition for comment.

Since taking charge, Musk has fired erstwhile Chief Executive Parag Agrawal and different apical management, and the company's advertizing and selling chiefs near soon afterwards, adding to concerns that Twitter does not person capable radical successful spot to show that it remains compliant with regulations.

The takeover has besides sparked concerns that Musk, who has often waded into governmental debates, could look unit from countries trying to power online speech.

It prompted U.S. President Joe Biden to say connected Wednesday that Musk's "cooperation and/or method relationships with different countries is worthy of being looked at."

ADVERTISERS NOT REASSURED

Musk told advertisers connected Wednesday, speaking connected Twitter's Spaces feature, that helium aimed to crook the level into a unit for information and halt fake accounts, hoping to assuage advertisers rattled by the changes astatine the company.

His assurances whitethorn not beryllium enough.

Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG.N) said connected Thursday it had pulled backmost its paid and owned contented connected Twitter "while we summation a amended knowing connected the absorption of the level nether its caller leadership."

It joined different brands including General Motors (GM.N) that person paused advertising connected Twitter since Musk took over, acrophobic that helium volition loosen contented moderation rules.

Musk sent his archetypal email to Twitter employees connected Thursday, saying distant enactment would nary longer beryllium allowed and that they would beryllium expected successful bureau for astatine slightest 40 hours per week, according to Bloomberg News.

In the email, Musk said helium wants to spot subscriptions relationship for fractional of Twitter's revenue.

On Thursday Musk tweeted: "Far excessively galore corrupt bequest Blue 'verification' checkmarks exist, truthful nary prime but to region bequest Blue successful coming months."

The attorney's enactment confirming the enforcement departures was archetypal reported by tech quality tract The Verge.

Reporting by Katie Paul successful Palo Alto, California and Paresh Dave successful Oakland, California; Additional reporting by Jeffrey Dastin successful Palo Alto, Diane Bartz successful Washington, and Yuvraj Malik successful Bengaluru; Writing by Sayantani Ghosh; Editing by Arun Koyyur, Shounak Dasgupta, Bill Berkrot and Deepa Babington

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.