The Treasury Department’s databases include information about individual and business taxes, medical records, Social Security payments and numbers, and government payments, as well as a long list of other personal data, such as birthdates, home addresses and phone numbers, military records and disability information, Davisson said.
Advocacy groups and labor unions have filed lawsuits in an attempt to save agencies and federal worker jobs, and five former treasury secretaries are sounding the alarm on the risks associated with Musk’s DOGE accessing sensitive Treasury Department payment systems and potentially stopping congressionally authorized payments.
The Department of Government Efficiency’s embed into the federal government has raised a host of concerns, transforming a debate over how to cut government waste into a confrontation over privacy rights and the nation’s financial standing in the world.
On the issue of cutting government programs or potentially undermining U.S. democratic norms, DOGE is “not going to care, but they should care about harming the dollar and harming the safety of U.S. government debt,” Metrick said.
On cybersecurity issues, the public has no idea what safeguards or policies, if any, Musk and his staffers used to protect the sensitive data they accessed, according to John Davisson, senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington-based nonprofit that advocates for digital privacy.
