1 00:00:01,920 --> 00:00:05,320 Hey everybody, welcome back to the Elon Musk Podcast. 2 00:00:05,400 --> 00:00:07,880 This is a show where we discuss. The Critical. 3 00:00:07,880 --> 00:00:12,800 Crossroads, the Shape, SpaceX, Tesla X, The Boring Company and 4 00:00:12,800 --> 00:00:15,600 Neurolink. I'm your host, Will Walden. 5 00:00:16,400 --> 00:00:24,440 A former Trump campaign aide A former Trump campaign aide is at 6 00:00:24,440 --> 00:00:26,760 the center of a federal data breach that leaks Social 7 00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:30,480 Security numbers of over 200,000 Americans, raising urgent 8 00:00:30,480 --> 00:00:34,480 questions about how a meme, a cryptocurrency project, gained 9 00:00:34,520 --> 00:00:37,440 access to sensitive government systems. 10 00:00:38,160 --> 00:00:41,920 Now the breach involves Doge Labs, a little known crypto 11 00:00:41,920 --> 00:00:45,960 startup run by Tommy Rensing, who previously worked for Donald 12 00:00:45,960 --> 00:00:48,840 Trump's 2020 campaign in digital strategy. 13 00:00:49,360 --> 00:00:53,280 Doge Labs had a contract with the US government to run a bot 14 00:00:53,280 --> 00:00:56,960 detection system under the pretense of helping federal 15 00:00:56,960 --> 00:01:00,240 agencies track misuse of public benefits. 16 00:01:00,720 --> 00:01:03,560 Instead, the company allegedly mishandled the personal data 17 00:01:03,840 --> 00:01:07,560 with Social Security recipients, exposing it in a breach that 18 00:01:07,560 --> 00:01:11,720 took place over several months. Federal investigators found that 19 00:01:11,720 --> 00:01:15,240 Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses and benefit 20 00:01:15,240 --> 00:01:19,680 payment details or accessible through an unsecured interface 21 00:01:19,680 --> 00:01:22,840 connected to Doge Labs back end system. 22 00:01:23,320 --> 00:01:26,440 The briefs didn't stem from a malicious attack at all, but 23 00:01:26,440 --> 00:01:30,400 from severe misconfigurations and how the system handled and 24 00:01:30,400 --> 00:01:34,880 stored sensitive data. Americans sensitive personal 25 00:01:34,880 --> 00:01:37,000 data. You should be mad about this. 26 00:01:37,160 --> 00:01:40,040 Your Social Security number, your birthday, your address and 27 00:01:40,040 --> 00:01:43,920 benefit payment details could have been leaked by these 28 00:01:44,160 --> 00:01:47,520 unprofessional people. There are rules for a purpose. 29 00:01:47,920 --> 00:01:51,640 Doge Labs reportedly left a staging server online without 30 00:01:51,640 --> 00:01:55,720 basic access controls. Anyone with the URL could scrape 31 00:01:55,720 --> 00:01:59,880 the data in bulk. I've set up staging servers 32 00:01:59,880 --> 00:02:03,560 before for clients. Could be an AWS server, it could 33 00:02:03,560 --> 00:02:07,200 be any other cloud service. We're not sure where it was at 34 00:02:07,200 --> 00:02:11,000 this point, but we're going to dig into this and we're going to 35 00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:12,800 let you know exactly what happened. 36 00:02:13,080 --> 00:02:15,960 But Doge Labs secured the contract through a pilot program 37 00:02:15,960 --> 00:02:18,640 designed to bring innovative tech startups into federal 38 00:02:18,640 --> 00:02:23,120 service procurement pipelines. The program fast tracked vendors 39 00:02:23,360 --> 00:02:26,160 who could demonstrate AI and machine learning capabilities 40 00:02:26,400 --> 00:02:29,040 and renting pitch. Doge Labs is a tool that can 41 00:02:29,040 --> 00:02:32,880 detect fraudulent behavior in benefit claims using blockchain 42 00:02:32,880 --> 00:02:36,360 based identity scoring. The government bought the idea 43 00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:39,400 without fully vetting the system's infrastructure or 44 00:02:39,400 --> 00:02:43,280 compliance with data protection protocols, and the exposure 45 00:02:43,280 --> 00:02:46,400 affected data from at least three federal agencies, Social 46 00:02:46,400 --> 00:02:50,640 Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, and 47 00:02:50,640 --> 00:02:57,080 the Department of Veterans Affairs. 3 absolutely important 48 00:02:57,520 --> 00:03:00,720 agencies. All three used DOGE Lab software 49 00:03:00,720 --> 00:03:03,080 as a part of an experimental fraud prevention initiative 50 00:03:03,080 --> 00:03:06,200 launched in 2023. Internal emails reviewed by 51 00:03:06,200 --> 00:03:10,240 investigators show the concerns about Doge Labs data handling 52 00:03:10,240 --> 00:03:13,720 practices were raised as early as May, but federal tech 53 00:03:13,720 --> 00:03:17,360 officers dismissed the warnings as over cautious. 54 00:03:17,880 --> 00:03:19,640 Tommy Rensing has denied wrongdoing. 55 00:03:19,640 --> 00:03:22,040 It claims that no actual data was stolen. 56 00:03:22,320 --> 00:03:25,760 He described the system as safe and secure and said any exposure 57 00:03:25,760 --> 00:03:28,280 was due to a minor miscommunication between 58 00:03:28,280 --> 00:03:32,080 subcontractors that contradicts federal findings that the data 59 00:03:32,080 --> 00:03:36,840 was not only accessible but also downloaded by outside parties 60 00:03:36,840 --> 00:03:41,640 over a period of five weeks before the server was taken 61 00:03:41,640 --> 00:03:45,280 offline. No details about these outside 62 00:03:45,280 --> 00:03:49,640 parties who has downloaded it, but they did it over 5 weeks. 63 00:03:49,640 --> 00:03:53,240 They have all of your data now. If you think that's not 64 00:03:53,240 --> 00:03:56,760 important or you're just going to miss push that to the side, 65 00:03:57,680 --> 00:04:00,320 that's on you. But your Social Security number, 66 00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:05,920 your benefits, VA, etcetera were all exposed due to this DOGE 67 00:04:05,920 --> 00:04:09,080 subcontractor. The government has not publicly 68 00:04:09,080 --> 00:04:13,080 confirmed how many people were affected, but an internal audit 69 00:04:13,400 --> 00:04:17,519 found 212,415 Social Security records had been exposed. 70 00:04:17,959 --> 00:04:23,960 212,000 people at Social Security numbers have been 71 00:04:23,960 --> 00:04:27,120 exposed and downloaded for five weeks straight. 72 00:04:27,400 --> 00:04:30,400 Most of the individuals are recipients of Medicare, 73 00:04:30,680 --> 00:04:36,200 disability or VA benefits. The breach impacted elderly and 74 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:39,520 low income Americans more so than anybody else. 75 00:04:39,800 --> 00:04:43,120 Several civil rights groups were preparing lawsuits, as they 76 00:04:43,120 --> 00:04:46,600 should, and demanding answers about why a crypto startup but 77 00:04:46,600 --> 00:04:50,240 no public track record was entrusted with such sensitive 78 00:04:50,360 --> 00:04:54,960 federal systems. Now, mind you, I'm a reporter. 79 00:04:55,640 --> 00:04:58,760 I'm neither here nor there. I'm right down the middle and I 80 00:04:58,760 --> 00:05:02,680 call it like it is. If these people messed with your 81 00:05:02,680 --> 00:05:06,120 Social Security numbers or messed with your VA benefits, 82 00:05:07,680 --> 00:05:10,120 they did something absolutely wrong. 83 00:05:11,120 --> 00:05:13,760 Absolutely. And they should feel the wrath 84 00:05:13,800 --> 00:05:16,840 of all these lawsuits because you know what? 85 00:05:17,160 --> 00:05:19,040 It's not about left or right. It's not about your stupid 86 00:05:19,040 --> 00:05:21,560 politics at this point, any politics. 87 00:05:21,800 --> 00:05:27,080 This is about people stealing trustworthy Americans data 88 00:05:27,960 --> 00:05:36,200 because they were they were unsecure in their ways of doing 89 00:05:36,200 --> 00:05:38,720 business. Doge Labs. 90 00:05:39,440 --> 00:05:41,800 How dare you. How dare you. 91 00:05:41,920 --> 00:05:45,520 A staging server, Really A public date staging server where 92 00:05:45,520 --> 00:05:47,640 anybody with the URL could scrape your data. 93 00:05:47,920 --> 00:05:51,640 It takes about 10 minutes to create a scraping bot if you 94 00:05:51,640 --> 00:05:56,400 have the URL to a a website and also if you have a URL to a 95 00:05:56,400 --> 00:05:58,880 website where all the data is out there in the open. 96 00:05:58,880 --> 00:06:05,160 If you have a link, literally all you need to do for some 97 00:06:05,160 --> 00:06:12,800 instances is control all control a control copy, put it into a 98 00:06:12,800 --> 00:06:19,360 spreadsheet, control paste and run it through chat TBT, see if 99 00:06:19,360 --> 00:06:20,920 you can get any great data out of it. 100 00:06:21,200 --> 00:06:26,640 And if you can, that's good for the hackers that did this, that 101 00:06:26,920 --> 00:06:30,240 hacked into the system. You know what hackers will hack 102 00:06:30,600 --> 00:06:34,120 and these people should have been absolutely secure with your 103 00:06:34,120 --> 00:06:36,160 data. This is your data, Americans. 104 00:06:37,120 --> 00:06:41,320 These people at Doge Labs did you dirty. 105 00:06:41,760 --> 00:06:45,040 I want you to know that sometimes I get up in arms about 106 00:06:45,040 --> 00:06:48,000 some stuff. Stealing people's data, stealing 107 00:06:48,000 --> 00:06:52,360 people's sensitive veteran data. If you're a true American, if 108 00:06:52,360 --> 00:06:56,920 you're a patriot, you have to support the veterans. 109 00:06:57,120 --> 00:06:58,760 Everybody should support veterans anyway. 110 00:06:59,720 --> 00:07:02,880 They've done some crazy stuff in their life. 111 00:07:03,520 --> 00:07:06,400 They've, they've sacrificed a lot so we can stay free. 112 00:07:07,840 --> 00:07:10,640 So these people mess with veterans. 113 00:07:11,160 --> 00:07:15,480 They should get messed with too. In of court, of course, court 114 00:07:15,600 --> 00:07:20,840 and legal battles. But this isn't the only 115 00:07:20,840 --> 00:07:23,600 controversy surrounding Doge Labs right now. 116 00:07:24,400 --> 00:07:28,360 According to documents viewed by The Telegraph, the company used 117 00:07:28,360 --> 00:07:31,840 the same infrastructure to promote a meme coin campaign 118 00:07:31,840 --> 00:07:34,640 that launched just weeks before the breach was discovered. 119 00:07:36,400 --> 00:07:39,520 OK, so the DOE, the Dogecoin derivative token which is DOGE 120 00:07:39,520 --> 00:07:43,440 dot Fed, was hyped on social media as a pro Trump financial 121 00:07:43,440 --> 00:07:47,800 movement, with rensing using his campaign connections to attract 122 00:07:47,800 --> 00:07:50,680 far right influencers and fringe candidates. 123 00:07:51,120 --> 00:07:53,840 Several of those promotions included footage filmed at 124 00:07:53,840 --> 00:07:59,920 federal offices, which may violate ethics laws around 125 00:07:59,920 --> 00:08:02,480 commercial activity on government property. 126 00:08:03,360 --> 00:08:09,160 Come on man, this Rensink. Come on man you are a clown. 127 00:08:10,600 --> 00:08:14,360 Why do you OK now? The timing has raised questions 128 00:08:14,360 --> 00:08:16,760 about whether Rensink used his government access for personal 129 00:08:16,760 --> 00:08:19,160 or political gain. Looks like a little bit of both. 130 00:08:19,520 --> 00:08:22,160 You registered, dodged out feds smart contract. 131 00:08:22,160 --> 00:08:25,440 Just 10 days before he began the government pilot, he directed 132 00:08:25,440 --> 00:08:28,400 internal staff to use government funded servers for performance 133 00:08:28,400 --> 00:08:35,200 testing of the crypto token. Government funded servers for 134 00:08:35,200 --> 00:08:40,360 his own personal crypto token. This guy needs to get audited. 135 00:08:42,000 --> 00:08:44,680 Need to mess with him in court. I got to get him. 136 00:08:45,080 --> 00:08:47,440 Those servers were later identified as the source of this 137 00:08:47,440 --> 00:08:50,320 data exposure too. So anybody with access to these 138 00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:54,880 crypto coins and to test them, anybody should be questioned and 139 00:08:54,880 --> 00:08:57,240 they should be held accountable if they did anything wrong. 140 00:08:57,880 --> 00:09:00,800 Now, federal, federal fallout from the breach is already 141 00:09:00,800 --> 00:09:03,640 hitting Capitol Hill. Congressional aides confirm that 142 00:09:03,640 --> 00:09:07,000 Senate Democrats are preparing hearings into how the contract 143 00:09:07,000 --> 00:09:09,160 was awarded and what safeguards have failed. 144 00:09:09,720 --> 00:09:12,480 Some Republicans have also expressed concerns over the lack 145 00:09:12,480 --> 00:09:16,120 of oversight and tech contracting, though Trump allies 146 00:09:16,120 --> 00:09:19,920 have attempted to distance the former president and current 147 00:09:19,920 --> 00:09:24,200 president from rensing, calling him a volunteer with limited 148 00:09:24,200 --> 00:09:28,840 responsibilities. OK, so we all know that's not 149 00:09:28,840 --> 00:09:32,360 true. Limited responsibilities. 150 00:09:32,360 --> 00:09:35,120 Don't think that's true if you have access to Social Security 151 00:09:35,120 --> 00:09:37,240 numbers. That's not a limited security 152 00:09:37,720 --> 00:09:41,320 and lot limited authority, not limited responsibilities. 153 00:09:41,640 --> 00:09:45,920 You are absolutely not a volunteer if you have access to 154 00:09:45,920 --> 00:09:47,520 Social Security numbers. Now. 155 00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:51,320 The scandal also comes as Trump intensifies calls to gut the 156 00:09:51,320 --> 00:09:55,440 federal workforce. Now, at a rally this weekend, he 157 00:09:55,440 --> 00:09:58,080 praised Rensing's push for private innovation and said 158 00:09:58,080 --> 00:10:01,800 federal agencies should move fast and break things when 159 00:10:01,800 --> 00:10:04,200 dealing with fraud. Just like Silicon Valley, man, 160 00:10:04,840 --> 00:10:09,960 he's taking a play, a play out of, you know, a Meta. 161 00:10:10,200 --> 00:10:15,440 And all the Silicon Valley elites that I used to work for 162 00:10:15,440 --> 00:10:18,440 back in the day don't like him anymore. 163 00:10:18,440 --> 00:10:21,880 By the way, I like code. I like creating things. 164 00:10:22,280 --> 00:10:25,720 But Silicon Valley, it was a long time ago. 165 00:10:26,440 --> 00:10:29,320 Trump also proposed eliminating entire agencies like the 166 00:10:29,320 --> 00:10:34,160 Department of Education and the EPA to fund a new AI and crypto 167 00:10:34,160 --> 00:10:37,560 task force that would partner directly with private firms. 168 00:10:37,720 --> 00:10:40,480 Now, that approach echoes the kind of low accountability 169 00:10:40,480 --> 00:10:44,320 contracting that allowed Doge Labs to slip through our 170 00:10:44,320 --> 00:10:48,320 fingers. Now the offense of Management 171 00:10:48,520 --> 00:10:51,200 and Budget issued an immediate suspension of all contracts 172 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:54,920 issued under the same tech pilot that approved Doge Labs. 173 00:10:55,000 --> 00:10:58,960 The White House also ordered a full review of every agency that 174 00:10:58,960 --> 00:11:03,400 uses third party AI for fraud prevention or citizen data 175 00:11:03,400 --> 00:11:05,840 handling. That review will likely result 176 00:11:05,840 --> 00:11:09,360 in stricter federal tech procurement standards and data 177 00:11:09,360 --> 00:11:12,960 access audits for existing contractors. 178 00:11:13,720 --> 00:11:16,560 Now Those Labs has deleted its website. 179 00:11:16,800 --> 00:11:19,960 It disabled all public phasing services, right? 180 00:11:19,960 --> 00:11:23,560 Singh is reportedly preparing a launch of a legal defense fund, 181 00:11:24,040 --> 00:11:27,400 arguing that the breach is being politicized ahead of 2026 182 00:11:27,400 --> 00:11:31,760 midterms. Meanwhile, affected users have 183 00:11:31,760 --> 00:11:33,920 begun receiving breach notifications, with some 184 00:11:33,920 --> 00:11:37,520 reported fraudulent activity on their credit reports within 185 00:11:37,520 --> 00:11:41,800 weeks of the leak. Wow, this is a horrible 186 00:11:41,800 --> 00:11:45,080 situation. How dare they do this to 187 00:11:45,080 --> 00:11:48,720 veterans and other people, people that don't have much. 188 00:11:49,680 --> 00:11:51,240 What? OK, I'm going to say it. 189 00:11:51,320 --> 00:11:53,480 What a scumbag. What a loser. 190 00:11:54,840 --> 00:11:58,600 Let me know what you think in your podcast comments because 191 00:11:58,600 --> 00:12:01,480 this is a this is a dirty one. This is a dirty one. 192 00:12:01,480 --> 00:12:03,280 Let me know what you think. All right. 193 00:12:03,280 --> 00:12:06,040 Take care, everybody. Hey, thank you so much for 194 00:12:06,040 --> 00:12:08,240 listening today. I really do appreciate your 195 00:12:08,240 --> 00:12:09,760 support. If you could take a second and 196 00:12:09,760 --> 00:12:12,720 hit the subscribe or the follow button on whatever podcast 197 00:12:12,720 --> 00:12:15,720 platform that you're listening on right now, I greatly 198 00:12:15,720 --> 00:12:17,360 appreciate it. 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