Elon Musk's DOGE Posts Classified Data on Its New Website | Hacker News Reader

Elon Musk's DOGE Posts Classified Data on Its New Website

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94 pointsf38zf5vdt33 comments

Oh god, this is like when that one type of executive insists that you give full database access and a firewall exception so that some SaaS report-builder tool will let them "generate insights" and "demonstrate value".

One type? Damn near all of them! +1 nonetheless

edit: We'll get to demonstrate more value cleaning up the mess this creates! SWE/SRE is controlled opposition, change my mind /s

Most of this is from FedScope:

https://www.fedscope.opm.gov/

But the part Musk was not suppose to unveil:

>> Musk can’t claim he wasn’t aware that the National Reconnaissance Office is one of the nation’s intelligence agencies. His company, SpaceX, has a $1.8 billion contract with NRO to build hundreds of spy satellites.

Is that a crime?

I imagine it's a crime if you have a security clearance. But as far as I'm aware these guys never promised not to give away classified information.

Of course they can be pardoned, and they don't even need a pardon if the Justice Department decides not to prosecute. But just as a matter of idle curiosity, has any law actually be violated?

When questions about their access has arisen earlier the administration has said they were granted security clearances. Releasing classified information is in that case is potentially illegal and at a minimum was normally result in your security clearance being revoked. But these guys didn’t go through the normal processes for obtaining a security clearance, so there is no reason to believe the normal rules and laws will be followed now.

Although outside the norm nothing about this is beyond the rights of the executive. The DoJ has always had prosecutorial discretion and the granting of security clearances has always been a discretionary decision of the executive.

Didn't you hear the news? No laws or regulations apply to the executive branch any longer. Anything they do is, by their estimation, legal. </s>

> But as far as I'm aware these guys never promised not to give away classified information.

It does not matter what they promised, as it is against the law to give away classified information:

> Whoever knowingly and willfully communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available to an unauthorized person, or publishes, or uses in any manner prejudicial to the safety or interest of the United States or for the benefit of any foreign government to the detriment of the United States any classified information— […]

* https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/798

The President will just say he declassified the information in his head before the data was disclosed. Even if he didn’t, he may argue this is an "official act" and cannot be subject to prosecution.

> has any law actually be violated?

Any revelation of classified information to uncleared people violates the law; if DOGE staff were cleared it was illegal for them to reveal it, if they weren't it was illegal for them to be given access to it in the first place (which they must have had in order to reveal it).

Additionally, there are crimes for gathering and revealing sensitive national security information irrespective of having clearance, these are found in the Espionage Act. Julian Assange’s crime didn't involve him having clearance.

Meaningless question. You don't have a fully functional justice system any more.

It’s not a crime because POTUS can post-facto declassify it, so that when Musk posted it, it was declassified.

Ask Assange

Specifically about the NRO:

> The website states in tiny print at the bottom that its database excludes information from U.S. intelligence agencies.

> But an easy search shows that DOGE’s database provides details on the National Reconnaissance Office, the federal agency that designs, builds and maintains U.S. intelligence satellites. Not only are NRO’s budgets and head counts classified, but the prospect of Musk’s tech team meddling in sensitive personnel information is setting off alarms for some in the intelligence community.

The NRO runs the US's spy satellites:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Reconnaissance_Office

russians are wining the cold war. They have successfully compromised US from within.

As a European, I feel this rings closer to truth than fiction.

Russian already lost Cold War long time ago.

That's only what it looked like in the early 90s. Evidence, facts and current events state otherwise.

looking a lot more like we only thought we won

"US Vice President Vance shuns Scholz and meets AfD party leader instead" - https://www.euronews.com/2025/02/14/us-vice-president-vance-...

Maybe Putin is right. It's Nazis everywhere.

I think it's so wild as to be unbelievable by most people. It's the same reason the climate crisis is denied by so many people - because it seems so scary as to be unthinkable so they mentally categorize it as fiction or propaganda.

The US has long been the leader in pure military force. The Russians, however, discovered that the way to defeat this is from within - with psychological manipulation. A bomb goes off and instantly destroys everything around it. This weapon, however, is just as powerful but works very slowly and methodically.

I think it goes something like this: Putin knows he needs to get to Trump. To get to Trump, he needs to find a person that has shown that they posses a mind to get what they want and also has the one thing that makes them a god in Trump's eyes. Elon is the perfect target, as he has both - he's the richest man alive, meaning Trump worships him and he has the financial power and mindset to enact real change. I think it's entirely possible that Putin and Russian intelligence figured out how to get into Elon's mind and radicalize him (he has several known conversations with Putin himself), using him as a puppet to get to the white house. All of the ideas this guy and his entourage are parroting mirror the ideas of one person - the greatest enemy of democracy in the world - Putin.

I'm not some conspiracy theorist. In fact I hate it and am proudly banned from the conspiracy subreddit for informing them that they're all delusional. That said, I truly believe this is really happening. Unless this is immediately stopped, this will lead to the darkest period in the history of the modern world.

I wonder what are the chances that a group within the US Government intelligence communities recognizes what's going on here and is monitoring it?

It’s really much more simple and banal than that. The fact is, Trump and Musk are just a pure distillation of our narcissistic culture. Their venality is the venality of our society. None of this would be possible without the public’s buy-in. Fact of the matter is we did this to ourselves, we are a sick society, and Putin just got lucky.

If you want to frame it Cold War terms tho, you could say Capitalism turned out the same as Communism, just took longer. In the end no one won the war.

No waste and fraud so far, but making good progress in leaking of classified info. It’s just another unspeakable horror for people who decided to help USA and will be killed by adversaries as a result...

> No waste and fraud so far,

Really?

Yep. They claim all sorts of things, but there is no transparency or proof that any wastage or actual fraud was present.

It's all just ideological things that Project 2025/MAGA/Daddy Musk doesn't like. The CFPB is a perfect example. Musk wants to get into finance so he's gutting a department that only exists to protect consumers.

You really did expand here, so I’m guessing you’re talking about Cybertrucks order from feds, which is apparently on hold now after it got some publicity:

> State Department halts plan to buy $400M worth of armored vehicles from Musk’s Tesla

https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-tesla-biden-federal-con...

This attitude is what cost your party this election.

the site would be better if the back button worked.

Does anyone know if there's non-classified data, like something similar that already exists?

Would be interesting to see (e.g. where all the contract money is, etc)

"Who’s working for Elon Musk’s DOGE?" - https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/02/14/doge-empl...

I am so sick of these media sites putting information that is critical to the free world behind a paywall so they can make their money above all. This is information that NEEDS to be known, and the media is a massive part of the problem for doing this.

https://archive.is/Nsk0W

So DOGE now has access to data that Congress can't even see?

Wow, it's actually a great website.

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