DOGE "hackathon" to bring together all US tax data

Some men appointed by US President Trump under the name DOGE are organizing a "hackathon" at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The aim is to create a "mega API", i.e. an interface for accessing all tax data. A commercial company is to help with this.

This is reported by Wired. According to the report, Palantir is the leading candidate. Its founder and Chairman of the Board of Directors, Peter Thiel, is a billionaire and a close business partner of Elon Musk, who runs DOGE.

Data protectionists are dismayed as the tax data is sensitive. Until now, different data sets have been deliberately kept separate in dozens of systems for the purposes of data protection and data security. IRS employees are only given selected access to data that they need for their work. The DOGE hackathon aims to tear down these protective walls.

The entire code base is to be reprogrammed in just 30 days. Anyone with access to the planned mega interface would be able to view, copy and evaluate all the data. Misunderstandings are likely, as the meaning of the individual data records is not readily comprehensible.

Clear-cutting IT security

DOGE stopped all ongoing projects to modernize the IRS IT in advance and dismissed dozens of IT experts. Most recently, the head responsible for the architecture and implementation of IT security was dismissed, as was the head of risk management and the deputy CISO (Chief Information Security Officer). It is unclear whether those involved in the "hackathon" have undergone appropriate security checks.

DOGE stands for Department of Government Efficiency, but is not actually a department as defined by US law. Rather, it is an office set up by Barack Obama in the White House. Until Donald Trump's second inauguration, it was called the US Digital Service and advised federal authorities on IT issues with the aim of improving digital government services. Now called DOGE, it is headed by Elon Musk and is made up of Special Government Employees (SGE) who are employed outside of the usual hiring process and pay scales.

As Wired further reports, DOGE also wants to shut down the so-called Direct File at the IRS. This is a new service that allows taxpayers to file their tax returns directly online with the IRS free of charge. Without Direct File, Americans would once again have to entrust their data to third-party, profit-oriented companies and pay these companies to submit their tax returns to the authorities.

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