Twitter is seeking to terminate a $150 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) following allegations of violating user privacy. Lina Khan, head of the agency, faced questioning about the FTC’s investigation into Twitter by Congress last week. Twitter claims that the FTC’s investigation has been burdensome and vexatious, with accusations of bias. Court filings from Twitter’s attorneys included a statement from a third-party auditor who felt the FTC was attempting to influence the outcome before the investigation began. Twitter is now asking the federal court in San Francisco to put an end to the settlement reached in 2022.
In their court documents, Twitter accuses the FTC of demanding over 22,000 documents from the company. In addition, Twitter is requesting a stay of Elon Musk’s deposition, arguing that he was not a party to the original consent decree and should not be required to give a deposition. Twitter claims that it tried to arrange a meeting between Musk and Khan, but she insisted on compliance with FTC requests first.
There have been allegations from GOP members that Khan and the Democrats are targeting Musk based on his political views, particularly regarding his content moderation policies following his acquisition of Twitter. The FTC’s focus has been on Twitter’s alleged violations of a consent decree from a decade ago, which aimed to protect user data. The FTC contends that Twitter has failed to adhere to the previous decree.
Twitter entered into a consent decree with the FTC in 2011, which was expanded in 2022. This decree required regular security audits and transparency regarding the handling of sensitive data. Khan emphasized the importance of privacy and security during the congressional hearing, stating that Twitter holds sensitive data on millions of Americans, including private messages.
The FTC has chosen not to comment on the matter.
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