Yoel Roth, the head of security and integrity who was brought in to publicly address concerns advertisers and users had about the platform, is reportedly the latest to leave the company. The walkouts began the same day Elon Musk addressed workers for the first time, saying “bankruptcy is not out of the question,” according to multiple reports. The day began with the resignations of three top security officials – Chief Information Security Officer Lea Kissner, Chief Privacy Officer Damien Kieran and Chief Compliance Officer Marianne Fogarty – prompting warnings from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). (Twitter reached a settlement over privacy issues with the FTC in May.) Following those departures, Roth and Twitter’s head of customer solutions, Robin Wheeler, also left the company. I made the difficult decision to leave Twitter. I’ve had the opportunity to work with amazing people and I’m so proud of the privacy, security and IT teams and the work we’ve done. I can’t wait to see what’s next, starting with my reviews of @USENIXSecurity 😁 — Lea Kissner (@LeaKissner) November 10, 2022 In an email to employees and a subsequent staff meeting, Musk did little to inspire confidence in the company’s future. In an email, Musk described the difficult financial conditions the company was in and how important he believed its subscription service, Twitter Blue, was to its future. “Without significant subscription revenue, there is a strong possibility that Twitter will not survive the coming economic downturn,” Musk said in the email. “We need about half of our revenue to be subscription.” An employee also said at the staff meeting that Musk appeared to downplay employee concerns about how a Twitter workforce was handling its obligations to maintain privacy and data security standards. Musk’s memo and staff meeting echoed a conversation broadcast live on Wednesday in which he sought to assuage the concerns of big advertisers and made his most extensive public comments about Twitter’s direction since closing the $44 billion deal dollars to buy the platform at the end of last month and rejected its top executives. The departures compound issues that have plagued the social media platform since Musk bought it. Musk’s buyout and the resulting confusion over product launches and content moderation policies led many brands, including General Mills, to stop buying ads on Twitter — a development the billionaire sought to rectify in live streaming for advertisers. The duo leading the live stream, Roth and Wheeler, have now both left the company. “So the two people Elon brought in to talk to advertisers in an attempt to get them to continue working with the company just quit,” tweeted Rashad Robinson, the president of Color of Change. “Companies that stay with Twitter at this point will be tied to these dangerous and seamless policy changes.” The company’s Twitter Blue subscription product, which launched Wednesday and lets users buy a verified blue checkmark for $8, has already led to several accounts being verified despite impersonating brands or notables. Some civil rights groups worry that the lack of clarity about content moderation policies and the unlimited ability to buy a blue check could lead to — if they haven’t already — a plague of hate speech and the spread of misinformation. They called on more brands to stop advertising on the platform. “I’ve never seen a billionaire beg for your $8 this much,” said Derrick Johnson, president of the NAACP. “Clearly, our efforts – calling on companies to stop all advertising on Twitter – are paying off. Companies need to be held accountable, and Twitter is no exception. Hate speech and misinformation have no place.” Under the company’s settlement with the FTC, Twitter is required to conduct privacy audits before making any changes to its products. But in a letter posted on Slack by a lawyer on the company’s privacy team and reported by the Verge, the author says they heard the company’s chief legal officer, Alex Spiro, “say that Elon is willing to take a huge risk on this company and its users because “Elon puts rockets into space, doesn’t fear the FTC.” The company’s legal team is now asking engineers to “self-certify” that their features comply with the FTC’s privacy rules and standards, according to the Verge. In the letter, the lawyer said people should make use of the protections available to whistleblowers “if you feel uncomfortable about anything you are asked to do”. Messages seeking comment were left on Twitter, but it is unlikely anyone will respond as the communications department has been fired.
