Cybersecurity Policy Report, DOGE Team’s Compliance With Privacy Laws Faces Reviews by GAO, IG, (Feb 14, 2025)
A White House government efficiency team’s review of the Treasury Department will itself be reviewed by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the Treasury Department’s inspector general (IG), Sens. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.) and Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) announced today.
Sen. Wyden, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, and Sen. Warren, ranking member of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, joined eight other Senate Democrats to request the GAO and IG review whether the White House team violated any privacy or cybersecurity laws or policies when it accessed Treasury’s networks.
The White House Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), now officially known as the U.S. DOGE Service and led by White House adviser Elon Musk, accessed sensitive Treasury networks in ways that have raised concerns about the security and privacy of Treasury data.
In a letter to GAO, the senators asked for a review of, among other things, whether the DOGE team was in compliance with federal privacy and cybersecurity laws and policies and whether “individuals granted access to these [Treasury] payment systems may be using information they obtained via this access for their own personal gain.”
They made a similar request in a letter to the Treasury Department’s IG. “The access provided to Mr. Musk’s team ... has important privacy implications for Americans across the country,” they told Loren Sciurba, Treasury’s deputy IG.
“With access to these systems, Mr. Musk’s team would apparently have access to individuals’ Social Security numbers, addresses, bank account identifiers, and federal taxpayer information,” they said.
Such information is protected under the Privacy Act and other federal laws, they added.
“It is not at all clear that Mr. Musk or DOGE officials meet the strict criteria that would allow them to access the sensitive information protected by these statutes, raising questions about whether their access—or the decision to grant it—constituted a criminal offense or otherwise violated the law,” the senators said.
“Nor is it clear that the Department has consistently adhered to all other laws, regulations, and policies that protect such sensitive information,” they said.
Mr. Sciurba accepted the assignment in a letter sent yesterday to the senators. The IG will review “the adequacy of controls in place for granting or restricting access” to Treasury’s “sensitive payment systems,” he said.
“Given the breadth of this effort, the audit will likely not be completed until August; however, we recognize the danger that improper access or inadequate controls can pose to the integrity of sensitive payment systems. As such, if critical issues come to light before that time, we will issue interim updates and reports,” Mr. Sciurba told the senators.
The senators also received a letter from the GAO that said it would review the DOGE team’s activities and “conduct one body of audit work and issue multiple reports, if needed.”
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