Twitter faced a halting Tuesday as the takeover led by Elon Musk moved into a contentious phase. The billionaire’s bid to acquire the social platform faced a new setback after a former Twitter security chief raised concerns, adding to the reasons cited to potentially cancel the purchase.
A letter to Musk’s legal team, disclosed to the Securities and Exchange Commission, indicated that Twitter intends to compel Musk to complete the deal. This follows a previous communication from the company, which argued that Musk’s side had engaged in improper practices that would breach the merger agreement. The parties earlier agreed to a deal valued at roughly $44 billion, but the situation remains unsettled as of mid-2025.
The allegations from Twitter’s former head of security, reported by The Washington Post, center on data privacy and consumer protection obligations, as well as concerns about the platform’s resilience against outages and cyber threats at its data centers.
According to Twitter, if the accusations prove true, they would signal a violation of the merger terms and could give Musk the right to terminate the agreement under its provisions.
Earlier in the year, Musk signaled concerns about the deal after no immediate answer from Twitter regarding the number of fake accounts and the company’s methods for identifying and suspending them.
By May, the businessman appeared to have reconsidered. A temporary hold on the Twitter purchase was noted, with the agreement valued at about $44 billion at the end of the previous quarter, pending detailed calculations from Twitter that the miscount may affect less than five percent of users.
In late July, a Delaware Chancery Court judge announced that the case seeking to annul Musk’s decision to buy Twitter would be heard in October. On Twitter’s side, a vote was anticipated for September to secure shareholder approval of the original sale terms agreed with Musk.
Financial results from the period showed a notable swing. The second quarter of 2022 recorded a net loss of 270 million dollars, contrasted with a profit of 65 million dollars in the same period a year earlier. Revenue for the quarter hovered around 1.1766 billion dollars, down roughly 1.1 percent, a decline Linked in part to continued uncertainty surrounding the pending acquisition by Musk’s vehicle, Twitter, a subsidiary.