The Security Concerns Surrounding Elon Musk and SpaceX

The recent revelations about Elon Musk's potential clearance issues have sparked concerns among security experts and government officials. As the CEO of SpaceX, a company that has been involved in classified launches for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Musk's clearance status is a matter of great importance.

According to sources, SpaceX does not have a cleared organization, but rather, it is the Space Exploration Technologies LLC (SETI) that holds the clearance. This raises questions about how Musk's responsibilities as CEO are being handled in terms of security protocols. As someone who has been involved in classified work, Musk would be expected to follow certain guidelines and procedures to ensure the safety and security of sensitive information.

The issue becomes even more complex when considering Musk's foreign contacts, including his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin. While it is not clear whether Musk has been violating any laws or regulations by engaging with foreign officials, the fact that he has not been forthcoming about these interactions raises concerns about his potential clearance status.

NASA officials have confirmed that they are investigating SpaceX's clearance situation, which is a major concern for the government. If Musk's clearance is deemed to be a serious issue, it could lead to significant consequences for both him and SpaceX.

The revelation also highlights the challenges of enforcing security protocols in the private sector. As a billionaire with significant influence, Musk may feel that he is above certain laws and regulations, which can create a sense of impunity. This is particularly true when it comes to issues related to foreign contacts and potential clearance violations.

It is worth noting that having a secret clearance does not necessarily make someone eligible for a top-secret or sensitive clearance. The process of obtaining a clearance involves a series of background checks, interviews, and forms to be filled out, which can be time-consuming and complex. Even with a secret clearance, individuals must still follow certain guidelines and procedures to ensure the safety and security of sensitive information.

The case of Elon Musk serves as a reminder that even those in positions of power are not above the law when it comes to security protocols. The government has a responsibility to enforce these regulations and ensure that sensitive information is handled properly.

A Look at the Clearance Process

For those who have had clearances in the past, they know that the process can be complex and time-consuming. According to clearancejobs.com, which provides resources for individuals seeking federal employment, mistakes on forms or during interviews can lead to clearance denials. In extreme cases, this can result in job loss.

The reality is that even those with top-secret clearances must still follow certain guidelines and procedures to ensure the safety and security of sensitive information. This includes filling out forms when dealing with foreign contacts, which can be a bureaucratic nightmare for those involved.

A Discussion on the Importance of Clearances

In today's world, having a clearance is no longer just a matter of national security, but also personal responsibility. When it comes to handling sensitive information, individuals must take their responsibilities seriously and follow established protocols.

The example of Elon Musk highlights the challenges of enforcing security protocols in the private sector. As someone who has been involved in classified work, Musk may feel that he is above certain laws and regulations, which can create a sense of impunity.

However, this is not an excuse for non-compliance. The government has a responsibility to enforce these regulations and ensure that sensitive information is handled properly. For those seeking federal employment or working with sensitive information, it is essential to understand the importance of clearances and follow established protocols.

The Ticking Time Bomb of Trump's Foreign Contacts

The story of Donald Trump taking huge piles of classified materials into his bathroom at Mar-a-Lago is a concerning reminder of the risks associated with foreign contacts. When it comes to handling sensitive information, there must be consequences for non-compliance.

As someone who has been involved in sensitive work, I can attest that following established protocols is essential. The fact that Trump may have taken classified materials into his bathroom raises questions about his potential clearance status and whether he was in violation of federal regulations.

The reality is that the government must take action to enforce these regulations and ensure that sensitive information is handled properly. This includes holding individuals accountable for their actions, regardless of their position or influence.

A Message from the Host

As a host of this show, I want to emphasize the importance of following established protocols when it comes to handling sensitive information. Whether you are a government official or an individual with access to classified materials, there must be consequences for non-compliance.

The case of Elon Musk serves as a reminder that even those in positions of power are not above the law when it comes to security protocols. I encourage everyone to take their responsibilities seriously and follow established guidelines.

In conclusion, the clearance issues surrounding Elon Musk serve as a stark reminder of the importance of following established protocols when handling sensitive information. Whether you are a government official or an individual with access to classified materials, there must be consequences for non-compliance.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthis is Twi lots to talk about uh this week uh and I see that we actually have uh something that's kind of right up your alley but before we got too far along I did want to talk about disinformation do you follow uh this as much as you did probably not when you were at siio right Alex oh yeah well you I'm still plugged in I'm still teaching at Stanford I just okay taught a taught a class on Friday um what's the class uh so in the fall I teach a intro to cyber security class for the Masters in cyber policy so you can do a master's in international policy at Stanford and there's a cyber specialty it's the first class uh for those students um so it's basically teaching lawyers and political scientists how to hack stuff uh it's it's great you teach a lawyer how to use Metasploit uh it's a dangerous thing no kidding yeah holy cow yeah it's uh how fascinating though um so you know it's funny in 2016 and 2020 we heard a lot about Russian disinformation and uh you know Russian troll farms and uh so forth um this this time around not quite as much although we are starting to also hear about Chinese involvement I saw a story that said the Chinese are looking more at down ballot yes uh campaigns than at the presidential campaign I thought that was kind of interesting why what is China's interest do you think in our election what would they like okay so overall there is more foreign interference in this election than any American election before uh no kidding yeah including Russian so the Russian activi is larger and like you said everybody else has gotone involved which we have this long history in the cyber world of some country will do something big and spectacular and then everybody else will copy it right you have you know the Iranian attacks in the early 2000s uh and the 2009 Aurora attacks end up being copied by everybody else you have stuck net getting copied you have the Snowden disclosures laying out a bunch of surveillance techniques that end up getting copied and so it's the same thing here that the Russian disinformation techniques from 2016 everybody else around the world looked at that and like oh I'd like they learned the lesson United States like like the us our team at at Stanford has actually ritten up a number of cases where unfortunately the Pentagon has paid for troll Farms to do the same thing for countries we don't like which I think is actually really bad on a number of levels one it's like an incredible waste of money like the the people the US pays for this are incompetent um so it's a big waste of taxpayer dollars but it's also just incompatible with American ideals but back to your point like the the Iranians and the Chinese have been massively involved this time as well and they have very different geopolitical interests than the Russians while while they are aligned in a lot of ways their goals in the US election are quite different than Russian goals the Russians it's my understanding wanted to flood the field with not with garbage just to destabilize uh well that was I mean that was the big goal in 2016 right like the big difference between Russian activity in 2016 and 2024 is in 2016 they didn't have like a big strategic purpose you see kind of two themes in 2016 the internet research agency their big theme was to flood the Zone with garbage that their goal was to drive division in the United States the the number one thing they talked about was black lives matter actually if you do an analysis of their content was just to push divisive themes and they wanted to amplify divisive content the gru campaign was meant at harming Hillary Clinton and that's really Vladimir Putin does not like Hillary Clinton he personally blames her for he believed the state department under her watch was trying to forment a revolution against him and he wanted to weaken her does that mean he wanted Trump to be elected 2016 it's very hard to tell like what his purpose was but he didn't like Hillary but it wasn't that big of a campaign in 2016 in 2024 Russia is involved in the largest War they have fought since World War II it is now larger than Afghanistan they have lost more men than they L lost in Afghanistan they're they're approaching probably 100,000 dead um they've spent billions of dollars they've lost a significant portion of for example their armored vehicles a huge number of helicopters and planes um a portion of sovereign Russian soil is being occupied by Ukraine right now I mean like as big of a deal as the Russia Ukrainian war is to us it's a humongous deal for them and so they have a real strategic purpose now for their disinformation that they did not have in 2016 and are they looking for a candidate who will surrender basically stop supporting Ukraine I think what if you look at what they're trying to do they really have two goals one is they want Donald Trump to win but that's not good enough the other thing they need is they need to build a base of support in the United States for the idea that Ukraine is an enemy of the United States and that surrendering this war and pulling all support from Ukraine is in the best interest of the United States which is an idea that did not exist 2 3 years ago right it 3 four years ago nobody cared about Ukraine right like no America other than Ukrainian or Russian Americans with some kind of link to the region before The Invasion you're saying before The Invasion and before this Russian campaign Crimea wasn't enough for people to be upset no no back during the Crimean Invasion like people were not it was not something that was on people's radar and that is what if you look at the Russian activity now it is about is about supporting Trump now explicitly in a way it was not in 2016 where it was much more diffuse and if it was about Trump Hillary it really wasn't about trump it was about about just weakening Hillary as a candidate right and now it is explicitly about inserting the idea in the populist right that it's a good idea to cut off Ukraine not just that it's acceptable but that that is the right thing for America um and that is been incredibly effective and that is why you see them spending millions of dollars you know we had this indictment by the FBI of foreign agents who were taking Russian money and giving them to American influencers millions of dollars people are making you know that story got so undercovered unbeliev it felt like that was a huge story yes that there were podcasters there were influencers who were it turns out on the Russian payroll Americans yes and I feel like it we mentioned it got mentioned and then just kind of oh yeah and if you think it's just those guys like I have a bridge to sell you that's who we caught right those are the ones who have been caught so far right why did why why do we lose interest I I think it's you know I think it's kind of hard to trace the money Trail I think also um Russia is historically very good at exploiting this uh this category I believe the term of art is useful idiots yeah these are not these are not like you know secret agents these are not people who actually have any contact necessarily with uh with Russian agents in any form it's just Russia has identified that if we boost the profile the influence the voice of this person you know uh who has you know who has these wacky ideas then that will serve our larger goals so clear the goal with those guys is they were already big the goal was they were paying them to talk about Ukraine right is that those guys were big about talking about cultural issues talking about schools talking about trans issues and the Olympics and like whatever but the normal normally people don't care about Ukraine right like it's just not something that is on the radar of the cultural right normally and so by paying them that money they could take it from off the radar to making it on the top five list of the things that they're going to get angry about in their podcast in their video in their newsletter and that is what has been effective they've been doing that for years and so that is you know right now one of the big movies like I I don't know if you guys seen it but like you know when I open up Amazon Prime they're trying to show me hey there's a big biopic of Ronald Reagan right and you can go and like you know one of the big scenes is Dennis Quaid getting up there and telling Mel gorbachov to bring down this wall and so the at the same time that we're celebrating Ronald Reagan the party of Reagan has become Pro Russia and and so like if you just take an incredible a step back historically the Russian campaign has been incredibly effective right that a humongous chunk of the Republican party is now aligned and beli Vladimir Putin over a big chunk of the American intelligence agencies and a bunch of American Allies and and believes that Russia is our Ally and that the democratically elected president of Ukraine is actually some kind of dictator and that the ukrainians deserve to lose a big chunk of their country and that that is why they're they're paying these people i' I've been watching For All Mankind uh which is on Apple TV it's basically an alternate history of the space race a great watch if you haven't watched it but um it's it's fascinating how you know how removed from the kind of cold war conflict uh which is a very central part of that uh that TV series The Russians get to the moon first in that yes kind of this permanent sputnick moment um right and you know like just watching it is a is a reminder of how you know how warped as you know I think Alex has pointed out the you know the the concept of Russia as kind of a you know a global um you know uh Global opponent I find that interesting that that uh they have been fairly Nimble in taking advantage of new technologies you know we are very concerned for instance about disinformation created by AI uh in this cycle and uh Russia has now been accused of being behind a a a deep fake of of trump ballots being uh destroyed in in the election they they've they've jumped on the Deep fakes right yeah um I mean they they you know back in 2016 they were taking videos and images and repurposing them there's a little bit of photoshopping but for the most part what they would do is they take a video of a riot and they would say look it's riots in America and you're like no that's actually that was Algeria right Latin America like hey look at the sign right like there no americ streets yeah um yeah and so you know it's it's deep fakes are now giving them the opportunity to make it just a little bit harder to to to disprove things and also to generate lots of content when they used to have to have either find content or they had to have a floor full of photoshoppers and and illustrators it just got easier right now it's a dude with a bunch of RTX 490s and open source models right is the internet research cor that that Farm is gone right it's gone well VY pran's dead right so like I mean that's one of the he was the guy remember who went went up against Putin and ended up dying in a suspicious plane crash yes it is amazing that things like if you're against Vladimir Putin there are a number of things you should not do right you should not drink tea go near a window stand near a window fly private right like there are just some things yeah pays better not to uh sh so here's the question I actually asked both of you sh should we be concerned about this because I mean we know it's happening and there are news headlines about it is it pers I'll ask you first ow and do you think Americans are persuaded by disinformation from China Iran and Russia I think the I think the danger to society is it's a little more subtle and probably a little more corrosive which is that people tend to people tend to just become coarsened and resistant to any kind of information um you know they they in in my industry they talk about news fatigue people are just kind of tired of it all you know they don't want to they don't want to hear about Ukraine they don't want to hear about Russia um you know they don't want to hear about this disinformation problem um because it's like okay well you're saying you're saying information is you know you're saying you can't trust anyone that kind of feeds into uh that feeds into people predispositions and it also serves probably Russia's and China's and Iran's goals is to just erode belief in institutions you agree Alex is that I mean certainly that's the case although I think some of that is we're just overwhelmed with news legitimate and illegitimate we're just sick of it I mean at least I am from 24-hour news channels and everywhere you I mean you have your in your hand you know this this Communicator even if you only on Instagram and Tik Tok is full of news so I think I understand why people are a little done you know I I think there are people listening right now saying do we have to talk about this isn't there a new iPhone or something we could talk about yeah on elections there's no good uh quantitative social science evidence that disinformation has thrown any elections um so you mention you me you know there's been a bunch of studies it unfortunately just it's quite hard it people have tried to follow panels of people like the the thing that that have been attempted in 2020 2022 and now that a number of groups are TR in 2024 is they will follow individual voters look at their preferences and then also look at what their media content looks like right and then see whether or not try to tie it all together right yes because it's just very hard for social scientists to look at like you know this big verse set of things that you look at it seems to be almost confirmation bias like if you believe something then will read the news and see the posts that confirm what you already believe in right does it change people's minds is the question but for my perspective I think if you just take a step back and you look at the big historical the fact that a big chunk of one of the major political parties in the United States has now decided to back Vladimir Putin in his major geopolitical interest in getting the United States to abandon Ukraine it looks like it's a victory I I outside of this massive political push it that seems less likely right like it it and so he certainly thinks it's successful and they have massively Double Down triple down like the investment the Russians are putting in is much larger and part of that is just the cost like if you know spending 10 1520 $30 million $40 million $100 million cheap it's nothing right like that's losing at the rate of which they're losing tanks and planes and men in this war spending $100 million to mess with America's elections where that is one of the only ways that they might possibly have a victory that is not a negotiated settlement is you know absolutely cheap compared to any other outcome there is and I will say this is a conspiracy theory and I don't know how valid this is but but there are data points for instance we've just learned that Elon Musk seems to talk to Putin somewhat regularly as does Donald Trump uh we've seen JD Vance basically say that that you know who cares if if you if Russia wins in Ukraine we just need to end it um and it it it feels like uh this conspiracy theory is that uh Donald Trump because of his age and cognitive difficulty will probably not be very interest he wasn't that interested in 2016 very interested in running the country that JD Vance will be kind of the uh de facto president JD Vance as we know is Peter Teal's uh Protege as is Elon Musk and there is this conspiracy theory and I want to really say UPF front there's this is a conspiracy theory that the technocrats see this as an opportunity to essentially run the country that the Peter teal and Elon musks of the world say hey here's an opportunity in in a vacuum to kind of move in and of course Vladimir Putin is probably the richest person in the world not Elon Musk we don't know how wealthy he is but he basically controls Russia's oil and gas uh interests um has the money to kind of and seems to be putting into all of this is this is this nuts or is this see this is where I feel like I'm I'm so inundated with information you know it's it's follow the money right Leo follow the money and unfortunately money runs our politics so andron Horwitz has declared American dynamism uh one of its big uh investment initiatives what does that mean it means defense Contracting so you've got a a venture capital firm saying you know hey if we can get in good with the government um and andreon and Horowitz the two co-founders of the firm have backed Trump this cycle um you know like we stand to make money yeah well and and then you have Jeff Bezos telling the Washington Post not to endorse a candidate uh and then immediately there that day blue origin Trump meeting with blue origin it just starts to feel a little back door back room Smoke Filled Room kind of cozy you know there's there's a is that disinformation working on me Alex you know just know in The Stranger Than Fiction Department there's a private space firm in for all mankind sorry to go back to my my current favorite TV show and it's just like you look at that and it's like nothing compared to the reality we're in of SpaceX and blue origin being basically NASA's only you know only options right I mean this is why you don't want to hear that that Elon Musk has been talking to Vladimir Putin on a regular basis because he essentially controls our or Aerospace our space industry because SpaceX Boeing has has f failed it did seem like the doj put a scare in him uh yeah he was he was paying a million dollars a day to people vot registering to vote which is turns out illegal uh I don't know though you know and the Putin thing's going to be if the musk's clearance issue is a serious one no kidding like um NASA says they are going to investigate this right so you know SpaceX does classified launches for natural con office in the air force that means they have what's called a facility clearance he is the CEO of SpaceX um I looked into this a little bit it doesn't look like they have a cleared it looks like the space exploration uh Technologies uh LLC is actually the cleared org they don't have a separate organization um so you know some way sometimes the way you do this is you have a separate company that does Federal Contracting and it doesn't look like they do this it looks like it's the the master organization um which means he has to have some kind of clearance what I've heard is he has a secret which is not incredibly hard to get it's probably the best he could do he's foreign born he has all these foreign contacts but even then with a secret I think you're still supposed to it's not as strenuous as with the tssci but you're still supposed to do things like file forms when you have foreign contacts with representatives of foreign governments um I once had a you know I went to I go to this conference called the munic security conference most years um I was at a simulation with a bunch of people including guy who uh used to be in the KGB which you're never really an X KGB agent the form I filled out just from that being in that room was God so like it's fine that's what but that's what you have to do if you actually want to follow the rules right you have a clearance uh it is at times I've had clearances yeah and and so right um it's something you do like if you work in cyber and you do this kind of work is you you know appropriately appropriately I think that's completely right and if why isn't Elon Musk doing this or is he right and so that's the question I mean if if he was not filling out a foreign contact form every time he talked to Vlad Putin I I think probably he's in violation if he's been doing illegal drugs he's certainly in violation right um and so this becomes a big this becomes like a real issue for him and SpaceX um because uh you know they cannot maintain a facility clearance and then becomes a real issue for the government because it it puts him in a very difficult position um because if he l es that then they're going to have to you know have a difficult discussion with SpaceX of whether or not he can stay a CEO or can he can he stay in the United States uh the revelations about his um his lack of legal status when he started um uh his first company ZIP 2 uh which then went allowed him to pay uh bankroll what became PayPal um you know and and led to his his whole current Fortune um I mean he a citizen now right so I don't think they can denaturalize him for like I mean he's outside the and you probably can't prosecute him for what really a minor C have you have minimal really you have minimal due process when it comes to clearances which is something they tell you yeah that's interesting yeah he don't expect this is different this is not the legal system right you don't have any rights what they which is what they tell you basically right and like you can go to clearancejobs.com like there's forums about this of people like low-level people who make tiny little mistakes and end up like having to lose their jobs that's by the way the difference cuz they're low-level people and it seems to be in this country if you're a billionaire you don't have to follow the same rules yeah and it's it's getting to the point of where it's I mean you talk about this or you talk about like Trump taking huge piles of tssi material into his bathroom at marago and it becomes difficult to like then go right tell people who work noral jobs of the Pentagon of like you know to give them these briefings of like you're going to go to leworth if you you know take a file folder home right like it's it it it it's becoming like I think it's becoming a real problem for the security establishment because it the the the obvious dual treatment of people here of is going to make it very difficult to enforce the rules hey thank you for watching this little snippet from our big show the news Round Table This Week in Tech I'm Leo laort each week we cover the week's Tech news in-depth analysis but it's also fun and engaging you'll find it at twit.tv along with all of our shows and if you want more just hit the Subscribe button and uh we'll be sure to bring you a lot more great content thanks for listeningthis is Twi lots to talk about uh this week uh and I see that we actually have uh something that's kind of right up your alley but before we got too far along I did want to talk about disinformation do you follow uh this as much as you did probably not when you were at siio right Alex oh yeah well you I'm still plugged in I'm still teaching at Stanford I just okay taught a taught a class on Friday um what's the class uh so in the fall I teach a intro to cyber security class for the Masters in cyber policy so you can do a master's in international policy at Stanford and there's a cyber specialty it's the first class uh for those students um so it's basically teaching lawyers and political scientists how to hack stuff uh it's it's great you teach a lawyer how to use Metasploit uh it's a dangerous thing no kidding yeah holy cow yeah it's uh how fascinating though um so you know it's funny in 2016 and 2020 we heard a lot about Russian disinformation and uh you know Russian troll farms and uh so forth um this this time around not quite as much although we are starting to also hear about Chinese involvement I saw a story that said the Chinese are looking more at down ballot yes uh campaigns than at the presidential campaign I thought that was kind of interesting why what is China's interest do you think in our election what would they like okay so overall there is more foreign interference in this election than any American election before uh no kidding yeah including Russian so the Russian activi is larger and like you said everybody else has gotone involved which we have this long history in the cyber world of some country will do something big and spectacular and then everybody else will copy it right you have you know the Iranian attacks in the early 2000s uh and the 2009 Aurora attacks end up being copied by everybody else you have stuck net getting copied you have the Snowden disclosures laying out a bunch of surveillance techniques that end up getting copied and so it's the same thing here that the Russian disinformation techniques from 2016 everybody else around the world looked at that and like oh I'd like they learned the lesson United States like like the us our team at at Stanford has actually ritten up a number of cases where unfortunately the Pentagon has paid for troll Farms to do the same thing for countries we don't like which I think is actually really bad on a number of levels one it's like an incredible waste of money like the the people the US pays for this are incompetent um so it's a big waste of taxpayer dollars but it's also just incompatible with American ideals but back to your point like the the Iranians and the Chinese have been massively involved this time as well and they have very different geopolitical interests than the Russians while while they are aligned in a lot of ways their goals in the US election are quite different than Russian goals the Russians it's my understanding wanted to flood the field with not with garbage just to destabilize uh well that was I mean that was the big goal in 2016 right like the big difference between Russian activity in 2016 and 2024 is in 2016 they didn't have like a big strategic purpose you see kind of two themes in 2016 the internet research agency their big theme was to flood the Zone with garbage that their goal was to drive division in the United States the the number one thing they talked about was black lives matter actually if you do an analysis of their content was just to push divisive themes and they wanted to amplify divisive content the gru campaign was meant at harming Hillary Clinton and that's really Vladimir Putin does not like Hillary Clinton he personally blames her for he believed the state department under her watch was trying to forment a revolution against him and he wanted to weaken her does that mean he wanted Trump to be elected 2016 it's very hard to tell like what his purpose was but he didn't like Hillary but it wasn't that big of a campaign in 2016 in 2024 Russia is involved in the largest War they have fought since World War II it is now larger than Afghanistan they have lost more men than they L lost in Afghanistan they're they're approaching probably 100,000 dead um they've spent billions of dollars they've lost a significant portion of for example their armored vehicles a huge number of helicopters and planes um a portion of sovereign Russian soil is being occupied by Ukraine right now I mean like as big of a deal as the Russia Ukrainian war is to us it's a humongous deal for them and so they have a real strategic purpose now for their disinformation that they did not have in 2016 and are they looking for a candidate who will surrender basically stop supporting Ukraine I think what if you look at what they're trying to do they really have two goals one is they want Donald Trump to win but that's not good enough the other thing they need is they need to build a base of support in the United States for the idea that Ukraine is an enemy of the United States and that surrendering this war and pulling all support from Ukraine is in the best interest of the United States which is an idea that did not exist 2 3 years ago right it 3 four years ago nobody cared about Ukraine right like no America other than Ukrainian or Russian Americans with some kind of link to the region before The Invasion you're saying before The Invasion and before this Russian campaign Crimea wasn't enough for people to be upset no no back during the Crimean Invasion like people were not it was not something that was on people's radar and that is what if you look at the Russian activity now it is about is about supporting Trump now explicitly in a way it was not in 2016 where it was much more diffuse and if it was about Trump Hillary it really wasn't about trump it was about about just weakening Hillary as a candidate right and now it is explicitly about inserting the idea in the populist right that it's a good idea to cut off Ukraine not just that it's acceptable but that that is the right thing for America um and that is been incredibly effective and that is why you see them spending millions of dollars you know we had this indictment by the FBI of foreign agents who were taking Russian money and giving them to American influencers millions of dollars people are making you know that story got so undercovered unbeliev it felt like that was a huge story yes that there were podcasters there were influencers who were it turns out on the Russian payroll Americans yes and I feel like it we mentioned it got mentioned and then just kind of oh yeah and if you think it's just those guys like I have a bridge to sell you that's who we caught right those are the ones who have been caught so far right why did why why do we lose interest I I think it's you know I think it's kind of hard to trace the money Trail I think also um Russia is historically very good at exploiting this uh this category I believe the term of art is useful idiots yeah these are not these are not like you know secret agents these are not people who actually have any contact necessarily with uh with Russian agents in any form it's just Russia has identified that if we boost the profile the influence the voice of this person you know uh who has you know who has these wacky ideas then that will serve our larger goals so clear the goal with those guys is they were already big the goal was they were paying them to talk about Ukraine right is that those guys were big about talking about cultural issues talking about schools talking about trans issues and the Olympics and like whatever but the normal normally people don't care about Ukraine right like it's just not something that is on the radar of the cultural right normally and so by paying them that money they could take it from off the radar to making it on the top five list of the things that they're going to get angry about in their podcast in their video in their newsletter and that is what has been effective they've been doing that for years and so that is you know right now one of the big movies like I I don't know if you guys seen it but like you know when I open up Amazon Prime they're trying to show me hey there's a big biopic of Ronald Reagan right and you can go and like you know one of the big scenes is Dennis Quaid getting up there and telling Mel gorbachov to bring down this wall and so the at the same time that we're celebrating Ronald Reagan the party of Reagan has become Pro Russia and and so like if you just take an incredible a step back historically the Russian campaign has been incredibly effective right that a humongous chunk of the Republican party is now aligned and beli Vladimir Putin over a big chunk of the American intelligence agencies and a bunch of American Allies and and believes that Russia is our Ally and that the democratically elected president of Ukraine is actually some kind of dictator and that the ukrainians deserve to lose a big chunk of their country and that that is why they're they're paying these people i' I've been watching For All Mankind uh which is on Apple TV it's basically an alternate history of the space race a great watch if you haven't watched it but um it's it's fascinating how you know how removed from the kind of cold war conflict uh which is a very central part of that uh that TV series The Russians get to the moon first in that yes kind of this permanent sputnick moment um right and you know like just watching it is a is a reminder of how you know how warped as you know I think Alex has pointed out the you know the the concept of Russia as kind of a you know a global um you know uh Global opponent I find that interesting that that uh they have been fairly Nimble in taking advantage of new technologies you know we are very concerned for instance about disinformation created by AI uh in this cycle and uh Russia has now been accused of being behind a a a deep fake of of trump ballots being uh destroyed in in the election they they've they've jumped on the Deep fakes right yeah um I mean they they you know back in 2016 they were taking videos and images and repurposing them there's a little bit of photoshopping but for the most part what they would do is they take a video of a riot and they would say look it's riots in America and you're like no that's actually that was Algeria right Latin America like hey look at the sign right like there no americ streets yeah um yeah and so you know it's it's deep fakes are now giving them the opportunity to make it just a little bit harder to to to disprove things and also to generate lots of content when they used to have to have either find content or they had to have a floor full of photoshoppers and and illustrators it just got easier right now it's a dude with a bunch of RTX 490s and open source models right is the internet research cor that that Farm is gone right it's gone well VY pran's dead right so like I mean that's one of the he was the guy remember who went went up against Putin and ended up dying in a suspicious plane crash yes it is amazing that things like if you're against Vladimir Putin there are a number of things you should not do right you should not drink tea go near a window stand near a window fly private right like there are just some things yeah pays better not to uh sh so here's the question I actually asked both of you sh should we be concerned about this because I mean we know it's happening and there are news headlines about it is it pers I'll ask you first ow and do you think Americans are persuaded by disinformation from China Iran and Russia I think the I think the danger to society is it's a little more subtle and probably a little more corrosive which is that people tend to people tend to just become coarsened and resistant to any kind of information um you know they they in in my industry they talk about news fatigue people are just kind of tired of it all you know they don't want to they don't want to hear about Ukraine they don't want to hear about Russia um you know they don't want to hear about this disinformation problem um because it's like okay well you're saying you're saying information is you know you're saying you can't trust anyone that kind of feeds into uh that feeds into people predispositions and it also serves probably Russia's and China's and Iran's goals is to just erode belief in institutions you agree Alex is that I mean certainly that's the case although I think some of that is we're just overwhelmed with news legitimate and illegitimate we're just sick of it I mean at least I am from 24-hour news channels and everywhere you I mean you have your in your hand you know this this Communicator even if you only on Instagram and Tik Tok is full of news so I think I understand why people are a little done you know I I think there are people listening right now saying do we have to talk about this isn't there a new iPhone or something we could talk about yeah on elections there's no good uh quantitative social science evidence that disinformation has thrown any elections um so you mention you me you know there's been a bunch of studies it unfortunately just it's quite hard it people have tried to follow panels of people like the the thing that that have been attempted in 2020 2022 and now that a number of groups are TR in 2024 is they will follow individual voters look at their preferences and then also look at what their media content looks like right and then see whether or not try to tie it all together right yes because it's just very hard for social scientists to look at like you know this big verse set of things that you look at it seems to be almost confirmation bias like if you believe something then will read the news and see the posts that confirm what you already believe in right does it change people's minds is the question but for my perspective I think if you just take a step back and you look at the big historical the fact that a big chunk of one of the major political parties in the United States has now decided to back Vladimir Putin in his major geopolitical interest in getting the United States to abandon Ukraine it looks like it's a victory I I outside of this massive political push it that seems less likely right like it it and so he certainly thinks it's successful and they have massively Double Down triple down like the investment the Russians are putting in is much larger and part of that is just the cost like if you know spending 10 1520 $30 million $40 million $100 million cheap it's nothing right like that's losing at the rate of which they're losing tanks and planes and men in this war spending $100 million to mess with America's elections where that is one of the only ways that they might possibly have a victory that is not a negotiated settlement is you know absolutely cheap compared to any other outcome there is and I will say this is a conspiracy theory and I don't know how valid this is but but there are data points for instance we've just learned that Elon Musk seems to talk to Putin somewhat regularly as does Donald Trump uh we've seen JD Vance basically say that that you know who cares if if you if Russia wins in Ukraine we just need to end it um and it it it feels like uh this conspiracy theory is that uh Donald Trump because of his age and cognitive difficulty will probably not be very interest he wasn't that interested in 2016 very interested in running the country that JD Vance will be kind of the uh de facto president JD Vance as we know is Peter Teal's uh Protege as is Elon Musk and there is this conspiracy theory and I want to really say UPF front there's this is a conspiracy theory that the technocrats see this as an opportunity to essentially run the country that the Peter teal and Elon musks of the world say hey here's an opportunity in in a vacuum to kind of move in and of course Vladimir Putin is probably the richest person in the world not Elon Musk we don't know how wealthy he is but he basically controls Russia's oil and gas uh interests um has the money to kind of and seems to be putting into all of this is this is this nuts or is this see this is where I feel like I'm I'm so inundated with information you know it's it's follow the money right Leo follow the money and unfortunately money runs our politics so andron Horwitz has declared American dynamism uh one of its big uh investment initiatives what does that mean it means defense Contracting so you've got a a venture capital firm saying you know hey if we can get in good with the government um and andreon and Horowitz the two co-founders of the firm have backed Trump this cycle um you know like we stand to make money yeah well and and then you have Jeff Bezos telling the Washington Post not to endorse a candidate uh and then immediately there that day blue origin Trump meeting with blue origin it just starts to feel a little back door back room Smoke Filled Room kind of cozy you know there's there's a is that disinformation working on me Alex you know just know in The Stranger Than Fiction Department there's a private space firm in for all mankind sorry to go back to my my current favorite TV show and it's just like you look at that and it's like nothing compared to the reality we're in of SpaceX and blue origin being basically NASA's only you know only options right I mean this is why you don't want to hear that that Elon Musk has been talking to Vladimir Putin on a regular basis because he essentially controls our or Aerospace our space industry because SpaceX Boeing has has f failed it did seem like the doj put a scare in him uh yeah he was he was paying a million dollars a day to people vot registering to vote which is turns out illegal uh I don't know though you know and the Putin thing's going to be if the musk's clearance issue is a serious one no kidding like um NASA says they are going to investigate this right so you know SpaceX does classified launches for natural con office in the air force that means they have what's called a facility clearance he is the CEO of SpaceX um I looked into this a little bit it doesn't look like they have a cleared it looks like the space exploration uh Technologies uh LLC is actually the cleared org they don't have a separate organization um so you know some way sometimes the way you do this is you have a separate company that does Federal Contracting and it doesn't look like they do this it looks like it's the the master organization um which means he has to have some kind of clearance what I've heard is he has a secret which is not incredibly hard to get it's probably the best he could do he's foreign born he has all these foreign contacts but even then with a secret I think you're still supposed to it's not as strenuous as with the tssci but you're still supposed to do things like file forms when you have foreign contacts with representatives of foreign governments um I once had a you know I went to I go to this conference called the munic security conference most years um I was at a simulation with a bunch of people including guy who uh used to be in the KGB which you're never really an X KGB agent the form I filled out just from that being in that room was God so like it's fine that's what but that's what you have to do if you actually want to follow the rules right you have a clearance uh it is at times I've had clearances yeah and and so right um it's something you do like if you work in cyber and you do this kind of work is you you know appropriately appropriately I think that's completely right and if why isn't Elon Musk doing this or is he right and so that's the question I mean if if he was not filling out a foreign contact form every time he talked to Vlad Putin I I think probably he's in violation if he's been doing illegal drugs he's certainly in violation right um and so this becomes a big this becomes like a real issue for him and SpaceX um because uh you know they cannot maintain a facility clearance and then becomes a real issue for the government because it it puts him in a very difficult position um because if he l es that then they're going to have to you know have a difficult discussion with SpaceX of whether or not he can stay a CEO or can he can he stay in the United States uh the revelations about his um his lack of legal status when he started um uh his first company ZIP 2 uh which then went allowed him to pay uh bankroll what became PayPal um you know and and led to his his whole current Fortune um I mean he a citizen now right so I don't think they can denaturalize him for like I mean he's outside the and you probably can't prosecute him for what really a minor C have you have minimal really you have minimal due process when it comes to clearances which is something they tell you yeah that's interesting yeah he don't expect this is different this is not the legal system right you don't have any rights what they which is what they tell you basically right and like you can go to clearancejobs.com like there's forums about this of people like low-level people who make tiny little mistakes and end up like having to lose their jobs that's by the way the difference cuz they're low-level people and it seems to be in this country if you're a billionaire you don't have to follow the same rules yeah and it's it's getting to the point of where it's I mean you talk about this or you talk about like Trump taking huge piles of tssi material into his bathroom at marago and it becomes difficult to like then go right tell people who work noral jobs of the Pentagon of like you know to give them these briefings of like you're going to go to leworth if you you know take a file folder home right like it's it it it it's becoming like I think it's becoming a real problem for the security establishment because it the the the obvious dual treatment of people here of is going to make it very difficult to enforce the rules hey thank you for watching this little snippet from our big show the news Round Table This Week in Tech I'm Leo laort each week we cover the week's Tech news in-depth analysis but it's also fun and engaging you'll find it at twit.tv along with all of our shows and if you want more just hit the Subscribe button and uh we'll be sure to bring you a lot more great content thanks for listening\n"