Elon Musk claims the US Government had ‘full access’ to your private Twitter DMs

Twitter CEO Elon Musk has alleged that the US government had access to users’ private messages on Twitter.

In an extended interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson that will air Monday and Tuesday nights, Musk made the startling claims, noting how shocked he was to learn that the government had full access to private communications on the platform.

The billionaire mogul told Carlson how he was unaware of the fact until he joined the company and expressed surprise at the extent to which government agencies were able to monitor social media.

“The extent to which government agencies effectively had full access to everything that happened on Twitter surprised me,” Musk said. “I wasn’t aware of that.”

The extended interview with Tucker Carlson, pictured, will air on Monday and Tuesday evenings

“Would that include people’s DMs?” Carlson investigated.

“Yes,” Musk replied.

The extended interview with Carlson will air over the next two nights.

Musk’s admission that agencies had full access to everything that happened on Twitter, including direct messages, is likely to raise concerns among users who assumed their private conversations were completely private and secure.

While it’s unclear how long the government had such access, Musk’s comments suggest the situation is much more widespread than many might have thought.

In addition to discussing government surveillance of social media, Musk also expressed concern about the dangers of artificial intelligence.

In an alarming vision, Musk stated that he believes AI has the potential to bring about the downfall of civilization.

“AI is more dangerous than, say, poorly managed aircraft design or production maintenance, or poor car production in the sense that it has the potential – however small one may estimate that probability, but it’s not trivial – it has the potential for civilisation. destruction,” Musk said.

Twitter owner Elon Musk (left) gave an interview to American tech journalist James Clayton of the BBC

Last week, Musk, a self-confessed workaholic, confirmed in another interview with the BBC that he sometimes sleeps on a couch in a library at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters.

The Tesla and SpaceX boss was criticized for cutting half of the company’s full-time workforce in one week, ending remote work and issuing an ultimatum for the remaining workforce to agree to longer, more intensive work patterns or to leave.

It led to concerns that the platform would struggle to survive with the reduced maintenance team and available technicians.

Musk admitted that closing one of Twitter’s service centers was ultimately “quite catastrophic” as it resulted in the platform losing much of its functionality.

He also said that the company was now “roughly break-even,” could return to profitability soon, and that he would be open to selling to the right person.

Musk also revealed that old blue ticks will finally be removed this week.

Musk stated last month that legacy verified Twitter users would see their blue ticks removed from the service on April 1 unless they paid an $8 monthly fee for the Twitter Blue subscription operation.

As a result, thousands of high-profile users of the platform were braced to lose the ticks, which can help verify their identities and distinguish them from imposters.

But the old blue check marks have remained in place beyond the original April 1 deadline.