By Katherine Tinsley
12:15pm PDT, Apr 16, 2025
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Whistleblower
Daniel Berulis claimed DOGE staffers were given extensive access to the National Labor Relations Board systems in early March 2025. According to Berulis, 10GB of sensitive data — including business information, details of union activities and private affidavits — was exfiltrated from NLRB servers.
"I can't attest to what their end goal was or what they're doing with the data," Berulis told
NPR. "But I can tell you that the bits of the puzzle that I can quantify are scary. … This is a very bad picture we're looking at."
In a formal complaint, Berulis claimed the organization was responsible for a "significant cybersecurity breach."
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In an affidavit, Daniel Berulis pointed out how rare the incident was.
"That kind of spike is extremely unusual because data almost never directly leaves NLRB's databases," he stated.
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Daniel Berulis later told
Reuters that he noticed attempted logins from a Russian IP address with legitimate credentials, but they were blocked due to their location.
Donald Trump has been accused of cozying up to
Vladimir Putin due to his stance on the war between Russia and Ukraine.
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Daniel Berulis admitted that revealing DOGE's shortcomings could come at a cost.
"Unlike any other time previously, there is this fear to speak out because of reprisal," he told Reuters.
"We're seeing data that is traditionally safeguarded with the highest standards in the United States government being taken and the people that do try to stop it from happening, the people that are saying no, they're being removed one by one," he continued.
