“I no longer hack Paypals”: DOGE staffer’s hacker past raises red flags

Evidence of DOGE staffer’s proud history of hacking quickly deleted, report says.

See full article...

 

[Maniacpaul]

So they just didn’t do any background checks at all, eh?

“US Attorney General Pam Bondi told Reuters that Stanley's active government security clearance predated DOGE”

So apparently our security clearance processes sucked before as well?? I’d think if this guy had a security clearance (or was even trying to get approved for one) that those IA sites would have disappeared at that time. Since they didn’t that means either they either weren’t found during the background check, or were found to be irrelevant? Both of those concern me greatly!

 

[Sajuuk]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

Except we know, for a fact, that the Republican budget does not cut costs. They are, in fact, currently fighting the senate parliamentarian over their own rules regarding how to pay for more tax cuts.

Not that facts are any hinderance to lying fucking liars who lie.

 

[jazzylarry]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

Unfortunately unicorns don't exist, just like this vision of the future doesn't exist. What will happen is massive unrest, a tanking of the economy, trade falling off, and a general fall backwards of decades of lost productivity. We will wind up being a shell of what we were, much less a shadow of what could have been. All because some dimwit thinks the world works according to economic theories from the 1800s, which failed then too.

 

[adespoton]

My only hope is that in a few years, we would need to move to a different form of personal identification that's far more secure than a social security number.

Because clearly, we should expect that every single US citizens' SSN will be in the dark web (and therefore public domain) going forward.

Funny thing is, you can request a new SSN if you've been victim of identity theft. At this point, most Americans have been the victim of identity theft multiple times over, whether they're aware of it or not. But the SSN is only 9 digits long (although thankfully that's now randomized instead of using the old area-group-serial format that could tell anyone where you were located, what your employment status was, and when you received your SSN). But unlike pretty much every other country out there, there are no check digits, so any typo in an SSN will likely land on someone else's SSN instead.

SSNs should be like credit cards: 15 digits, only the first few having any meaning, randomized, with check digits, and designed to be automatically replaced whenever a data leak occurs or every 5-10 years. For the most part, people (and the government and employers) would likely have to keep track of up to two SSNs at any given time, which is nothing compared to all the other numbers we have to track these days.

Data has to be designed to go stale in a reasonable period. Someone who got their SSN in 1968 still has their entire life tied to that number, which includes area-group-serial data.

 

[Dzov]

According to the article this dude already had security clearance probably from space x work. Honestly lot of sketchy shit with doge and this dude is literally a scumbag but nothing from this article (other than being part of doge) says he is awful to me.

Being part of the it brown shirts though? Yeah... Damning

Exactly this. He could've found a legit job, and maybe he thought he did, but now he's working to dismantle our country. He's a traitor.

 

[faffod]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

Funny, I'm going to go out on a limb guess that we are not of the same color. Yet I do not feel like the Ars commentariat demonize me. So it's not that.

Which brings us to the rest of your thoughts on the current situation: None of the issues you bring up are the responsibility of the executive branch. If you want to see a reduction in our spending, talk to your representatives in the house and senate. THEY are the ones who set the budget. To be clear: that is laid out
in plain English in the constitution. Additionally, the executive is not allowed to create laws, Again that is the responsibility of the house and senate. Again, if you do not like the laws in this country, get your representatives to fix them.

I have lived under a fascist dictator, it does not go well for anyone involved. Thinking that "this is fine" because you are seeing the needle move in a direction that you wish to see it move it, and ignoring the authoritarian dictatorial power grab on display is stunningly shortsighted. You are not getting burned. Yet. Do not think that you have any representation in an authoritarian regime. Do not think that you will remain aligned for the rest of your life with the power hungry who are driving this.

 

[LG11]

Vintage DOGE.

 

[Hadrian's Waller]

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

The USA is a pillar of its own puffed up self importance. MAGA is only going to accelerate its takedown by China.

 

[poltroon]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

This is itself a pretty black and white view without much nuance, and it - to me, as someone who has worked in large organizations of people both public and private- seems to lack experience.

Government has to work for all the people. This means that it has a lot of rules, because it MUST serve everyone and it MUST be completely accountable. It means that we provide services and equal protection to kids with severe disabilities even if they can't read and are super expensive to serve. It means we can't just serve a convenient and most profitable ICP but have to, for example, deliver mail to every US address including the inconvenient ones. It means we have checks and balances because the very significant and overwhelming power of government should not reside in any one person.

There are lots of very good people in government who do amazing things with very small amounts of resources and who are - if you ask them - the first to try to take out waste, fraud, and abuse - when they can. Sometimes they are successful and sometimes not, because in any large organization of people, building consensus can sometimes take time.

If you think there's more waste, fraud, and abuse within the US government than say, Meta Inc, or any really big entity, I ask why you think that. IME large corporations spending billions of dollars have less control of their spending than government, and without any altruism amongst the staff.

Government entities make cost cutting decisions all the time. I would note, in fact, that what DOGE is doing is creating MORE costs not just for the government directly but for all the people who work with government downstream, and they will be creating more costs long term, as the US government loses its favored position creating contracts that were previously understood to be reliable.

As for the US debt - this is weird but in fact the global economy currently depends on a stable dollar and on the availability of Treasury Bills as a stable, reliable investment - which would not exist if the US didn't have debt. We are snowflakes in that way and we are not at all like your local club that has to balance cash flows on a short term. Obviously there's a point of too much debt even for the US Government - but again nothing DOGE is doing is creating less debt in either the short or long term.

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

I mean, we did ask for something in return from China - a lot of cheap stuff that makes our economy very strong. Every dollar that is not spent on shoes or other essential items is money being sucked up by companies selling discretionary game subscriptions or whatever else you buy, with IP margins in US hands and then going through Meta and Google's pockets to buy advertising to sell it to you.

Global trade is a good thing and Republicans used to be all about free trade.

Tariffs won't bring most manufacturing back unless people are certain they'll be in place forever and even then, expertise and supply chains are hard to move. They may also simply drop demand for those items and still leave them unprofitable to build entirely in the US. Ever wonder why so many companies are founded and headquartered in the very expensive California Bay Area? That doesn't even require physical plants to move and yet it stays strong as a center of tech innovation and power.

Every dollar of tariff paid by consumers is a dollar that won't go into buying goods and services from companies.

Manufacturing is easy to say but hard to do. It is good to have more than one source for sure - but I can tell from what you wrote that you don't work in manufacturing. There are a lot of very smart people out there to learn from and I encourage you to do so, to better understand how those systems actually work.

 

[42Kodiak42]

I don't like who the guy is now, he's still way too comfortable working with DOGE and Musk to be benefiting society.

But unless I missed something, it sounds like this guy's hacker past ended 15 years ago, shortly after he reached adulthood, and the early stuff doesn't really seem to go beyond misdemeanors (he says he stopped hacking into Paypals and getting root access to others computers in 2010, but there's no mention of those activities anywhere else in the article, I'm not sure what's going on there)

I'm also a bit reluctant to pass judgement on his current stances: Career prospects are an incredible source of motivated reasoning and his bosses target people with political opinions.

 

[kingjj]

And the IT people that doth protest that this guy has unfettered access to the payroll/direct deposit information for every government employee are currently "under investigation" for "workplace behavior"

Makes sense...

 

[burkoJames]

This fucking guy. It's always this fucking guy.

Don't label me a Nazi, man! I'm just a regular Joe working a job, man! You're the divisive one, man!

Anyone who complains about labels and presents themselves as a centrist indicates at best a lack of moral or ethical conviction in their political positions and is willing to adjust them to remain centrist and that is precisely the type of going along to get along bootlicker who supports Nazis even when they personally 'aren't a nazi'.

 

[NuSkooler]

I'll be honest, I couldn't care less if these kids were hackers, nothing really unusual there. It's more that they are hired by and performing criminal activity NOW that I'd say matters.

Well and good ol Big Balls apparently sold company secrets for money, so I'd say THAT is a concern.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

Oh bullshit. If you have a single fuck about "lowering debt" you wouldn't make cuts where essentially fuck all of the budget is spent. You also wouldn't cut taxes for the ultra-wealthy.

You just like seeing other people lower on the economic ladder than you suffer more than yourself.

 

[azazel1024]

So they just didn’t do any background checks at all, eh?

For most, no. They are required to pass suitability even if they are part of USDI, before being placed in an agency.

From all that I have been hearing, most have refused to comply and are still refusing to cooperate with suitability.

Things like listing foreign travels. Financial information. Known associates. Any criminal history, etc.

So they shouldn’t have security clearance or system clearance. That hasn’t stopped them from being granted that. Because, you know, reasons.

 

[monkeywrench76]

Anything he did as a minor should carry little weight. Anything he did as an adult is very concerning. Our Juvenile criminal justice system requires we give minors a second chance in most situations.

 

[dennis.kext]

I'm not gonna touch on the political part...

But I'm not sure I want to persecute a dev who did stupid teenage things, when he was a teenager.

I mean, I wouldn't want anybody coming after me for my SurferSerial contributions from 90-00s.

That being said, I would hope to at least be vetted before I get to touching gov stuff(I would fail the vetting process, I smoke pot, but still it should happen).

 

[theotherjim]

today striving to "be fair and just" and "don't be an asshole"

He'd better be careful there. He pretty much just defined the real meanings of "DEI" and "woke".

Expressing sentiments like that requires you to be fired these days. Or just disappeared by the ICE secret police.

 

[Dzov]

I'm not gonna touch on the political part...

But I'm not sure I want to persecute a dev who did stupid teenage things, when he was a teenager.

I mean, I wouldn't want anybody coming after me for my SurferSerial contributions from 90-00s.

That being said, I would hope to at least be vetted before I get to touching gov stuff(I would fail the vetting process, I smoke pot, but still it should happen).

Agreed, and none of us would care if he didn't have the ridiculous level of access Doge now has into every government database.

 

[LeftCoastRusty]

Only the best people. Yet another in the thousands of lies told to the American people by Trump.

 

[Dzov]

He'd better be careful there. He pretty much just defined the real meanings of "DEI" and "woke".

Expressing sentiments like that requires you to be fired these days. Or just disappeared by the ICE secret police.

Hilarious you say that. I was just going over a report at my workplace about parts of our website that might need to be changed else we run into trouble with the federal government. Things like the word "advocate" that apparently could be mistaken for DEI and making sure we don't have any positions like Director of Diversity.

 

[Jackattak]

I used to love reading comments on Ars. Usually deep and insightful. Now, its become this hatred thing, where the world is black and white. And if you and I dont share the same color, then youre the devil

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

Remember, the decision of cutting costs had to be made from within. And the status quo would never have allowed that

And wtf about goibalization? Yeah, china, take all our manufacturing jobs and we will ask for
Nothing in return.

America buys 30% of the worlds goods. Tariffs will initially raise costs but will be effective at bringing manufacturing back.

Thats a huge win because America is the pillar of the western world and its dominance was fading, as seen by the rise of China

Hey bruh how much we spending on defense?

 

[Thomas Harte]

I happen to think that government really was taken over by bureaucracy and thought whats being done was impossible. That the debt would just rise and rise and that it was like a law of physics. So even if you dont like the method, at least consider the goal if you think govt should spend less.

You've clearly been brainwashed, would suggest you try associating with reality. Here are some starters:

• CNBC: U.S. budget deficit surged in February, passing $1 trillion for year-to-date record;
• The Independent: DOGE cuts will ‘in all probability’ increase the U.S. deficit — by a lot: report
• Newsmax (yes, even Newsmax!): US Budget Deficit Rises 4% to $307 Billion

Luckily, when it comes to pocketbook issues, Trump famously "couldn't care less".

 

[monkeywrench76]

“US Attorney General Pam Bondi told Reuters that Stanley's active government security clearance predated DOGE”

So apparently our security clearance processes sucked before as well?? I’d think if this guy had a security clearance (or was even trying to get approved for one) that those IA sites would have disappeared at that time. Since they didn’t that means either they either weren’t found during the background check, or were found to be irrelevant? Both of those concern me greatly!

most illegal activities as a minor will not show up in a background check.

 

[monkeywrench76]

Hey bruh how much we spending on defense?

~Federal Spending

• 1 trillion on defense
• 4 trillion on social security and Medicare and other social benefits
• 1 trillion on interest
• 1 trillion on everything else

~4 trillion in income.

= Big deficits.

Anyone who is serious about balancing the budget would need to raise taxes and cut spending

 

[Cris E]

Even if he got his clearance thru SpaceX before his DOGE sojourn there is a world of difference between clearance to see space things and clearance to see financial things or clearance to see SSA or Medicare data or....

 

[TheGreenMonkey]

FTFA "Other national security experts seemed to agree that Stanley's hacking history shouldn't disqualify him from government work, noting that many young hackers start out this way before assisting in efforts to stop malicious activity."

While I agree with this in principal (everyone does some dumb shit as a kid), there is much context involved around those pasts. And covering up is where I start to have problems. I farked up royally as a teenager, but I own that. It is part of what makes me who I am today, and despite that I have been moderately successful in my careers. and having worked for 2 state governments I think someone out here has deemed my past as inconsequential.

I would feel better about this dude if he would have just owned up to it instead of covering it up and trying to erase it. As it is, because of the coverup anything he says and does now is circumspect in my opinion.

 

[Dzov]

Here's a nice graph of the U.S. Government Spending, FYTD 2025:
https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/federal-spending/

This page does mention $4.92 Trillion in Revenue as opposed the the $4T mentioned by monkeywrench, though that's counting the previous fiscal year and we all know how Trump is "killing it".

 

[kingjj]

most illegal activities as a minor will not show up in a background check.

These weren't misdemeanor offenses expunged once he hit 18, these were things he himself was boasting about. Now, they could be bullshit, sure (kids tend to lie about things almost as much as adults). But, such claims would most definitely be germane to the vetting process seeing that the DOGE squad seems to have access to whatever they want, from whoever they want it from, whenever they want it.

 

[monkeywrench76]

Here's a nice graph of the U.S. Government Spending, FYTD 2025:
https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/federal-spending/

This page does mention $4.92 Trillion in Revenue as opposed the the $4T mentioned by monkeywrench, though that's counting the previous fiscal year and we all know how Trump is "killing it".

yeah mine was a swag from my head. 2 trillion debt vs 3 trillion debt is crazy either way

 

[monkeywrench76]

These weren't misdemeanor offenses expunged once he hit 18, these were things he himself was boasting about. Now, they could be bullshit, sure (kids tend to lie about things almost as much as adults). But, such claims would most definitely be germane to the vetting process seeing that the DOGE squad seems to have access to whatever they want, from whoever they want it from, whenever they want it.

agreed. I have a soft spot for reforming minors.

 

[Retrosal]

Or worse - they did but didn't care.

More likely, they did background check - matched their requirements.

 

[Dan Homerick]

My only hope is that in a few years, we would need to move to a different form of personal identification that's far more secure than a social security number.

Because clearly, we should expect that every single US citizens' SSN will be in the dark web (and therefore public domain) going forward.

SSN is just an identifier. The problem isn't that it's too insecure. Instead, it shouldn't have any security at all. As in, we should literally have a 100% public DNS-like system where you enter a SSN and get the person's name (or the reverse).

Because only then would people be forced to stop treating SSNs as though they were secret. They're not. They're just ... not.

If you know someone's SSN, you should be no closer to being able to commit identity fraud than if you knew their first and last name. The only way an SSN should help the fraudster is if some company or organization is accepting a SSN as a form of authentication, a way that the fraudster could 'prove' that they are who they're claiming to be. That is bone-headedly wrong.

 

[veldrin]

So they just didn’t do any background checks at all, eh?

This is what bothers me far more than anything this guy may have done a decade or more ago.

Many people change, or at least learn to put their skills to productive use. The problem here is that it takes an actual investigation to determine whether that has actually happened and such investigations take long enough that we can be certain that no such investigation was done before letting this guy loose in the government.

 

[HamHands_]

As an aside to my prior comment, security clearances can be obtained even with a criminal past, they look at your whole history in making the decision.

Which is the smart way to do things, especially in cyber security where you need to hire offensive hackers; they're sometimes not going to be squeaky clean.

It's called the "whole-person" concept. Here is a document describing it

Just going off the article info alone, he seems fine to have a clearance. And well, I mean he got one so an investigation occurred and came to the same conclusion.

 

[Dzov]

Wow there is a lot of just... hate in this comment section.

All we know about this guy is that, as a kid, this guy made mistakes, corrected them and went on to have a normal cybersecurity career.

From that we've decided he is a "traitor", a "loser", and a "scumbag".

This is exactly the type of rhetoric I see in right wing forums, when they're talking about someone they don't like. You work for Planned Parenthood? You're a baby murdering sociopath!

I don't like DOGE and I don't like what it's doing, but I'm not letting that anger turn me into someone who stops seeing people as people.

They are stopping funding for museums, national parks, education, food, and more and this is only 2 months into their actions. I'm not sure what will be left after 4 years of looting of everything that makes America great. If you are comparing that level of destruction to some abortion providers, then that's on you.

 

[Dzov]

Just going off the article info alone, he seems fine to have a clearance. And well, I mean he got one so an investigation occurred and came to the same conclusion.

Dude, this is the Trump administration. Who is going to tell Elon or Trump "no"?

 

[Sajuuk]

Wow there is a lot of just... hate in this comment section.

All we know about this guy is that, as a kid, this guy made mistakes, corrected them and went on to have a normal cybersecurity career.

From that we've decided he is a "traitor", a "loser", and a "scumbag".

This is exactly the type of rhetoric I see in right wing forums, when they're talking about someone they don't like. You work for Planned Parenthood? You're a baby murdering sociopath!

I don't like DOGE and I don't like what it's doing, but I'm not letting that anger turn me into someone who stops seeing people as people.

What about "traitor", "loser", or "scumbag" dehumanizes someone?

No, that rhetoric usually involves saying something more like vermin. You should probably take your pearls and clutch them elsewhere if you're going to tone-police on behalf of fucking fascists.

 

[RZetopan]

So they just didn’t do any background checks at all, eh?

Alternatively, they did a background check. Remember that both Felon45 and Muskrat are criminals and psychopaths, so the new punk "aid" has to meet their stringent requirements.
They don't just hire anyone you know, it's criminals ALL the way down.