The Department of Health and Human Services sent employees an email warning them against responding to Elon Musk’s request to share their accomplishments from the past week, citing the possibility that responses could be read by malign foreign actors. The email rescinded a previous directive from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management that required employees to submit five bullets detailing their achievements. While there was no expectation for HHS employees to respond, the email provided guidelines for those who chose to do so, advising them to keep their responses general and to protect sensitive data. The confusion arose after Musk’s tweet stating that federal employees who failed to respond to the OPM email would be considered to have resigned.
President Trump praised the government-wide email, stating that it was a way to ensure that employees were actually working. HHS referenced concerns about malign foreign actors reading responses, suggesting that the responses would be fed into an AI system to determine the necessity of certain jobs. The U.S. has faced cybersecurity challenges with nation-state hackers, particularly from China and Russia, breaching sensitive systems and compromising communications. Last year, the Library of Congress and U.S. officials’ communications were hacked, prompting increased calls to use encrypted apps for security.
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