DOGE team member ‘mistakenly’ given ‘read/write permissions’ to payment system

Marko Elez, a former member of the Treasury Department’s Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) team, was mistakenly given “read/write permissions” on the Secure Payment System instead of “read-only,” according to Joseph Gioeli III of the Bureau of the Fiscal Service. This revelation came to light in a court filing related to a case where President Donald Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent were restricted in granting access to Treasury Department systems containing sensitive information.

Gioeli explained in the filing that on February 6, it was discovered that Elez’s database access to the Secure Payment System on February 5 had been configured incorrectly with read/write permissions. A forensic investigation was promptly initiated to review all activities on the server and database. However, the issue was quickly rectified once it was identified.

Elez’s access was promptly corrected to read-only, and he did not log into the system again after his initial session on February 5. Gioeli emphasized that Elez never took any action to exercise the ‘write’ privileges during the time he had read/write permissions. An ongoing forensic analysis is being conducted to confirm this.

The Treasury Department, the White House, a DOGE spokesperson, and the U.S. Digital Service were contacted for comments but did not respond in time for publication.

In another development, Thomas H. Krause, Jr., a Senior Advisor for Technology and Modernization at the Department of the Treasury, indicated in a court filing that he is currently the only Treasury DOGE team member and not an employee of the U.S. Digital Service. He mentioned that Elez, a former software engineer at Elon Musk’s companies, had resigned from his role on February 6.

It was reported by the Wall Street Journal that Elez was linked to a deleted social media account with racist remarks. Despite this, Vice President JD Vance advocated for his reinstatement, stating that social media activity should not ruin someone’s life. Elon Musk also expressed support for Elez’s reinstatement, highlighting the importance of forgiveness.

The DOGE initiative, spearheaded by Elon Musk, aims to eliminate government waste, fraud, and abuse. The developments surrounding Elez’s database access issue and subsequent resignation shed light on the challenges faced in securing sensitive government systems.