Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) foot soldiers paid another visit Wednesday to the federal agency where they were accused of causing a “significant cybersecurity breach.”
A whistleblower at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) made the accusation in an explosive NPR report Tuesday, offering evidence that DOGE took large amounts of data from the agency’s systems and risked a breach by foreign adversaries in the process.
Daniel Berulis, an IT staffer at the NLRB, said he first noticed the “breach” when large amounts of data left the agency’s systems after DOGE staffers—who insisted that their actions not be tracked—gained access. He also claimed to have observed suspicious log-in attempts from an IP address in Russia using DOGE’s new accounts.
A source told Forbes that representatives with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) arrived at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Wednesday for a two-hour meeting with leadership.
The topic of the meeting and the identities of the DOGE staffers involved remain unclear.
“If DOGE wasn’t here before, the story prompted them to pay us a visit today,” the source with knowledge of the meeting told Forbes. “All I know is that two to three people from DOGE are meeting with agency heads right now.”
DOGE’s presence comes a day after NLRB general counsel William Cowen assured agency staffers in a Tuesday email that DOGE has not been in contact with the agency.
“The NLRB has had no official contact with any DOGE personnel. We have not granted DOGE access to any agency systems, nor has DOGE requested access to agency system,” he wrote. “At this point in time, we have no evidence of any unauthorized or unusual activity on agency systems.”
He added, “Now that the allegations have been publicly reported, we will review our systems again to ensure no data was inappropriately accessed or compromised.”
NLRB’s leadership has also continued to cast doubt on Berulis’ claims of data mismanagement.
After DOGE’s meeting with agency leadership, sources told Forbes that some agency heads are “categorically denying it” in conversations with staff.
Berulis’ report paints a different picture, alleging that he received a “threatening note” when he attempted to bring up his concerns internally.
The message was taped to his door and included a photo of him that was apparently taken by a drone, he said.
Berulis has called for further investigation into the alleged suspicious activity and a review of DOGE’s conduct as it continues its sweep across federal agencies looking for “waste, fraud and abuse.”
“I can’t attest to what their end goal was or what they’re doing with the data,” said Berulis, in an interview with NPR. “But I can tell you that the bits of the puzzle that I can quantify are scary. … This is a very bad picture we’re looking at.”
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