U.S. House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas) and members Don Beyer (D-Va.), and Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) requested in a letter last Thursday that Republican leaders on the panel investigate cyber security vulnerabilities and practices of the Trump White House.
Citing media reports, the Democratic members asked the committee to investigate senior administration staffers using a Republican National Committee (RNC) email server, security on President Donald Trump’s Twitter [TWTR] account, and the president’s use of an outdated Android phone.
The letter notes that a hacker has previously revealed that Twitter accounts @POTUS, @realDonaldTrump, and the @PressSec of Press Secretary Sean Spicer were linked to unsecured Gmail accounts, for days. This reportedly opened an easy way to hack the accounts by requesting a password reset from Twitter, hack the unsecured Gmail account, and wait for the new password to arrive in the hacked inbox.
On the outdated phone, the committee members say Trump reportedly still accesses the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account even though the he received a secured and encrypted phone approved by the Secret Service upon taking office. They cite the danger that foreign intelligence services or hackers could access the older phone and use it as a kind of bug to record and transmit whatever it can pick up to hostile actors.
The letter says in comparison President Obama used a secure cellphone and “complained about its lack of features. Nevertheless, he understood the phone’s limitations arose from the extreme cybersecurity safeguards needed to protect national security.”
The Democratic members say next week’s Research and Technology Subcommittee hearing “presents and excellent opportunity to examine these issues and focus on these potential national security threats.”
The Republican committee leaders addressed in the letter include Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight Darin LaHood (R-Ill.), and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Research and Technology Barbara Comstock (D-Va.).
Johnson, Beyer, and Lipinski point out that in the past two Congresses the Republican-led committee opened investigations into the alleged use of personal email by the former Secretary of Energy and former Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency as well as the private email server of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.