Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover Under Probe In US. Here’s Why

The Elon Musk-Twitter relationship is a story that keeps on giving and in a new twist, a Bloomberg report claims that Musk’s $44 billion takeover is still facing US government scrutiny. While the volatile courtship, which the world’s richest man fought hard to back out of in court, ended on October 27, there hasn’t been a moment’s calm during this storm.

The US government is still seeking information on confidential agreements that Elon Musk made with foreign investors and whether those deals allow them to access users’ personal data, Bloomberg quoted an unnamed person familiar with the matter. The report further added that there are national-security concerns over whether these confidential agreements allow access to users’ personal data.

This revelation comes days after US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said she sees “no basis” for investigating the billionaire’s acquisition of Twitter in an interview with CBS News. “We have really no basis – to the best of my knowledge – to examine his finances of his company. I’m not aware of concerns that would cause us to [investigate],” Ms Yellen had said.

The social media giant has witnessed a chaotic 25 days under Elon Musk’s leadership.

Resignations, layoffs and ultimatums have become a regular feature at Twitter. 1,200 resignations followed Musk’s brutal firing spree, where he let go of 50 per cent of the company’s employees. In a bid to salvage what remains, Musk even resorted to sending the remaining employees an SOS: “Anyone who writes software, please report to the 10th floor at 2 pm today,” he’d said in an email.

Elon Musk’s attempts to revamp user verification with a controversial subscription service also led to chaos: a tsunami of fake accounts and pranks prompted major advertisers to step away from the platform.