The Defense Department has gotten a request from SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk to take over funding for his satellite network that has provided crucial battlefield communications for Ukrainian military forces since almost the beginning of its war with Russia, U.S. officials said Friday. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter not yet made public, said the issue has been discussed in meetings and senior leaders are weighing the matter. There have been no decisions. In a statement later Friday, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said, “We can confirm the Department received correspondence from SpaceX about the funding of Starlink, their satellite communications product in Ukraine. We remain in communication with SpaceX about this and other topics.” During a Pentagon briefing, she declined to provide any details about the communication or say to whom the correspondence was sent and when the communications with Musk began. Musk began sending Starlink satellite dishes to Ukraine just days after Russia invaded in February. On Feb. 28, Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov tweeted a photo of the first Starlink kits arriving on the back of a truck. Musk’s generosity was hailed by Ukrainians and seen as a game changer in war tactics — the Russians could try to cut Ukrainian ground communications but it could not control space. The Starlink system of more than 2,200 low-orbiting satellites has provided broadband internet to more than 150,000 Ukrainian ground stations. Early Friday, Musk tweeted that it was costing SpaceX $20 million a month to support Ukraine’s communications needs. In addition to the terminals, he tweeted that the company has to create, launch, maintain and replenish satellites and ground stations. CNN was the first to report the Musk request. The Starlink satellite internet’s vital role in Ukraine’s defense cannot be overstated. It has, for example, assisted front-line reconnaissance drone operators in targeting artillery strikes on key Russian assets. A senior military official on Friday made it clear that the U.S. believes the system has proven exceptionally effective on the battlefield. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to provide U.S. assessment of the Ukrainian battlefield. In a tweet on Friday, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mikhail Podolyak said Ukraine will find a solution to keep Starlink working. “Let’s be honest. Like it or not, @elonmusk helped us survive the most critical moments of war. Business has the right to its own strategies,” he tweeted. “We expect that the company will provide stable connection till the end of negotiations.” In response to multiple questions during the briefing, Singh said the Pentagon was working with the Ukrainian Defense Ministry. “We know that there is this demand, and (satellite communications) capability ... is needed and we want to be able to ensure that there are stable communications for the Ukrainian forces and for Ukraine.” The request from the world’s richest man to have the Pentagon take over the hundreds of millions of dollars he says the system is costing comes on the heels of a Twitter war between Musk and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. And in tweets overnight Musk referred to the friction, suggesting it may affect his decision to end his company’s largesse in funding the systems. In a Twitter exchange last week, Musk argued that to reach peace Russia should be allowed to keep the Crimean Peninsula, which it seized in 2014. He also said Ukraine should adopt a neutral status, dropping a bid to join NATO. Musk also started a Twitter poll asking whether “the will of the people” should decide if seized regions remain part of Ukraine or become part of Russia. In a sarcastic response, Zelenskyy posted a Twitter poll of his own asking “which Elon Musk do you like more?”: “One who supports Ukraine” or “One who supports Russia.” Musk replied to Zelenskyy that “I still very much support Ukraine, but am convinced that massive escalation of the war will cause great harm to Ukraine and possibly the world.” Andrij Melnyk, the outgoing Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, responded to Musk’s original tweet with an obscenity. It’s not clear how much of the cost of deploying Starlink satellite uplinks in Ukraine has been covered by U.S. funding. In April, the U.S. Agency for International Development said it had delivered 5,000 of the terminals. The Pentagon had no response to that question. Musk’s commitment to spend $44 billion to purchase Twitter “has to factor into his decision that he can no longer afford to do this for free,” said retired Army Maj. Gen. John Ferrari, a non-resident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Musk’s request that the Pentagon begin to pick up the tab comes as the Space Force and Pentagon have been looking at how commercial vendors will play a role in national security. Musk’s threat to withdraw highlights the risk of leaning too much on commercial capabilities, Ferrari said. “Commercial vendors always get to change their mind, ” Ferrari said, adding that the reliance on Starlink to provide communications for Ukraine also serves as a reminder that the Pentagon has to expand this service beyond SpaceX, he said. “The government needs many vendors for key capabilities, of course that often means more money, but it is an insurance policy and insurance costs money,” Ferrari said. In March, commander of U.S. Space Command Army Gen. James Dickinson said that having vendors provide needed capabilities, such as Maxar’s satellite imagery of stalled Russian convoys, has become essential, because it frees up limited military satellite assets to focus on other things. In his tweets, Musk also raised a question that various vendors and the Pentagon are considering as space becomes a more critical part of wartime operations: If a commercial vendor is assisting the U.S. and is targeted, does the U.S. owe it protection? “We’ve also had to defend against cyberattacks & jamming, which are getting harder,” Musk tweeted.

Elon Musk said Saturday his planned $44 billion takeover of Twitter should move forward if the company can confirm some details about how it measures whether user accounts are ‘spam bots’ or real people. The billionaire and Tesla CEO has been trying to back out of his April agreement to buy the social media company, leading Twitter to sue him last month to complete the acquisition. Musk countersued, accusing Twitter of misleading his team about the true size of its user base and other problems he said amounted to fraud and breach of contract. Both sides are headed toward an October trial in a Delaware court. “If Twitter simply provides their method of sampling 100 accounts and how they’re confirmed to be real, the deal should proceed on original terms,” Musk tweeted early Saturday. “However, if it turns out that their SEC filings are materially false, then it should not.” Read:Is Twitter down? Service appears to return after outage Musk, who has more than 100 million Twitter followers, went on to challenge Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal to a "public debate about the Twitter bot percentage.” Twitter declined comment Saturday. The company has repeatedly disclosed to the Securities and Exchange Commission an estimate that fewer than 5% of user accounts are fake or spam, with a disclaimer that it could be higher. Musk waived his right to further due diligence when he signed the April merger agreement. Twitter has argued in court that Musk is deliberately trying to tank the deal and using the bot question as an excuse because market conditions have deteriorated and the acquisition no longer serves his interests. In a court filing Thursday, it describes his counterclaims as an imagined story “contradicted by the evidence and common sense.” “Musk invents representations Twitter never made and then tries to wield, selectively, the extensive confidential data Twitter provided him to conjure a breach of those purported representations,” company attorneys wrote. While Musk has tried to keep the focus on bot disclosures, Twitter’s legal team has been digging for information about a host of tech investors and entrepreneurs connected to Musk in a wide-ranging subpoena that could net some of their private communications with the Tesla CEO.

Twitter has dropped a major roadblock in front of Elon Musk’s effort to take over the company, leaving investors to wonder about the mercurial Tesla CEO’s next move. The social media company has adopted a “poison pill” defense that makes it difficult for Musk or any other investor to buy Twitter without the board of directors’ approval. Musk, who currently owns about 9% of the company, last week disclosed an offer of about $43 billion, or $54.20 per share. Twitter’s next likely move is to formally reject Musk’s offer, although it could negotiate. Musk has a number of options which also include talks with the board, sweetening his offer, or even triggering the poison pill, which experts say would be disastrous for the company. In a regulatory filing on Monday, Twitter’s board said it approved the defensive move to protect the company from “coercive or otherwise unfair” takeover tactics. The board is leaving open the possibility of negotiating with Musk or another suitor. The filing says the shareholder rights agreement should not interfere with any merger or offer approved by the board. Although he said his offer was “final,” Musk may have to raise his bid to satisfy other shareholders. A Saudi prince who is among Twitter’s major shareholders scoffed at the offer last week in a tweet. Al Waleed bin Talal said he didn’t believe $43 billion is close to Twitter's value given its growth prospects. Twitter shares hit an all-time high of $77.63 in March 2021. When he made his offer public, Musk provided no details on financing, but such a disclosure could improve his chances. He could raise money by borrowing billions using his stakes in Tesla and SpaceX as collateral, and he could bring in other investors. The poison pill would give stockholders as of April 25 the right to buy one one-thousandth of a share of preferred stock for each common share they own, at a price of $210. The rights are triggered if any person or group of investors buys 15% or more of the company’s shares without board approval. The preferred stock would have the same voting rights as a common share, according to the filing, which does not specifically mention Musk. Also Read: Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter, make it 'maximally trusted' The poison pill essentially would spell the end of Twitter if Musk or another investor acquires 15% or more of the company, said James Cox, a professor of corporate and securities law at Duke University. Shareholders who exercise the rights and buy preferred stock at $210 would get $420 in Twitter stock or assets, he said. That would be more than Twitter can afford to pay, and likely would send the company into receivership, Cox said. “You want to create an event that Musk would never want to trigger because it would be the death of Twitter,” Cox said. He predicts that Musk and the board will negotiate, at least for a while, adding that no investor has ever crossed the line to activate a poison pill. Also Read: Elon Musk accused of breaking law while buying Twitter stock If Musk triggered the poison pill, he risks wiping out much of the money he has invested in Twitter because his stake would be diluted, said Columbia University law professor Eric Talley. “You want to deter someone from deliberately triggering the poison pill,” Talley said. Twitter's board has information that the average shareholder doesn't, such as earnings or market growth projections, and whether there's reason to believe that the share value is artificially depressed, Talley said. The board, he said, could just hold out. "They’re sitting right now on top of a poison pill that’s a bit of a showstopper. From a corporate law perspective, they’re on pretty solid footing right now if they just keep that in place and say they’re not comfortable bargaining at this stage.” Musk said in making his bid that Twitter “needs to be transformed as a private company” in order to build trust with users and do better at serving what he calls the “societal imperative” of free speech. He said shareholders, not the board, should decide whether Twitter goes private. Shares of Twitter closed Monday up 7.5% at $48.45, still $5.75 shy of Musk’s offer. That’s a sign that investors are skeptical of whether Musk can pull off the deal. Musk began accumulating Twitter shares in late January, ending up with a stake of about 9%. Only Vanguard Group controls more shares. A lawsuit filed last week in New York federal court alleged Musk illegally delayed disclosing his stake so he could buy more shares at lower prices. Musk took to Twitter to criticize board members in recent days, saying he’d save about $3 million per year by bringing the board salary to zero if his bid succeeds, and noting that board members collectively owning just a tiny financial stake in Twitter shows that their “economic interests are simply not aligned with shareholders.” Musk, who has more than 82 million followers, is a prolific tweeter who has criticized other celebrity accounts for not tweeting enough, suggesting that as a sign that Twitter is dying. The takeover episode will put pressure on Twitter executives to show that the company is not underperforming, said Olaf Groth, a business professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Even the entire social media business model of making money through advertising -- which Musk has questioned -- is now “up for discussion,” Groth said. “He may decide it’s not worth it, and that he sent a political signal to exert pressure,” Groth said. “Now all eyes are on Twitter and the clock is ticking.”    

Consumer Reports said Thursday it was able to easily trick a Tesla into driving in the car’s Autopilot mode with no one at the wheel. Its test came just days after a Tesla crashed in Texas, killing the two men in the car. Authorities say neither of the men were in the driver’s seat at the time of the crash. Tesla’s Autopilot partially automated system can keep a car centered in its lane, keep a distance from cars in front of it, and can even change lanes on its own with a driver’s consent. But Tesla has said the driver must be ready to intervene at all times. Also read: Scrutiny of Tesla crash a sign that regulation may be coming Consumer Reports said that during several trips on its closed tracks with an empty driver’s seat, its Tesla Model Y automatically steered along painted lane lines without acknowledging that nobody was at the controls. The Tesla that crashed outside of Houston over the weekend was a Model S, but also had an Autopilot function. “In our evaluation, the system not only failed to make sure the driver was paying attention, but it also couldn’t tell if there was a driver there at all,” said Jake Fisher, Consumer Reports’ senior director of auto testing, who conducted the experiment. “Tesla is falling behind other automakers like GM and Ford that, on models with advanced driver assist systems, use technology to make sure the driver is looking at the road.” Tesla, which is based in Palo Alto, California, and has disbanded its press office, did not immediately respond to inquiries about Consumer Reports’ assertions. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are in the early stages of an investigation into the Texas crash. Local authorities said one man was found in the passenger seat, while another was in the back. The car veered off the road, crashed into a tree and burst into flames, authorities said. Investigators should be able to determine whether the Tesla’s Autopilot system was in use. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on Twitter Monday that data logs “recovered so far” show Autopilot wasn’t turned on in the Texas crash, and “Full Self-Driving” was not purchased for the vehicle. He did not respond to reporters’ questions posted on Twitter. In the past, NHTSA, which has authority to regulate automakers and seek recalls for defective vehicles, has taken a hands-off approach to regulating partial and fully automated systems for fear of hindering development of promising new features. But since March, the agency has stepped up inquiries into Tesla, dispatching teams to three crashes. It has investigated 28 Tesla crashes in the past few years, but thus far has relied on voluntary safety compliance from auto and tech companies. Also read: NTSB: Tesla Autopilot, distracted driver caused fatal crash Also on Thursday, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. and Edward Markey, D-Mass., asked federal officials to conduct a thorough investigation of the Texas crash and make recommendations for improving automated driving. In the Consumer Reports test, Fisher said he engaged Autopilot while the car was in motion on the track, then set the speed dial to zero to stop it. Fisher then affixed a small, weighted chain on the steering wheel to simulate the weight of a driver’s hand. He then slid over into the front passenger seat where he was able to accelerate and decelerate the vehicle. “The car drove up and down the half-mile lane of our track, repeatedly, never noting that no one was in the driver’s seat, never noting that there was no one touching the steering wheel, never noting there was no weight on the seat,” Fisher said. “It was a bit frightening when we realized how easy it was to defeat the safeguards, which we proved were clearly insufficient.” Consumer Reports noted the test was performed on its closed track and that “under no circumstances should anyone try” to duplicate it. “Let me be clear: Anyone who uses Autopilot on the road without someone in the driver seat is putting themselves and others in imminent danger,” Fisher said. Also read: NTSB releases details in 2 crashes involving Tesla Autopilot

The fiery crash of a Tesla near Houston with no one behind the wheel is drawing scrutiny from two federal agencies that could bring new regulation of electronic systems that take on some driving tasks. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Natioanal Transportation Safety board said Monday they would send teams to investigate the Saturday night crash on a residential road that killed two men in a Tesla Model S. Local authorities said one man was found in the passenger seat, while another was in the back. They’re issuing search warrants in the probe, which will determine whether the Tesla’s Autopilot partially automated system was in use. Autopilot can keep a car centered in its lane, keep a distance from cars in front of it, and can even change lanes automatically in some circumstances. On Twitter Monday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk wrote that data logs “recovered so far” show Autopilot wasn’t turned on, and “Full Self-Driving” was not purchased for the vehicle. He didn’t answer reporters’ questions posed on Twitter. Also read: NTSB: Tesla Autopilot, distracted driver caused fatal crash In the past, NHTSA, which has authority to regulate automakers and seek recalls for defective vehicles, has taken a hands-off approach to regulating partial and fully automated systems for fear of hindering development of promising new features. But since March, the agency has stepped up inquiries into Teslas, dispatching teams to three crashes. It has investigated 28 Tesla crashes in the past few years, but thus far has relied on voluntary safety compliance from auto and tech companies. “With a new administration in place, we’re reviewing regulations around autonomous vehicles,” the agency said last month. Agency critics say regulations — especially of Tesla — are long overdue as the automated systems keep creeping toward being fully autonomous. At present, though, there are no specific regulations and no fully self-driving systems available for sale to consumers in the U.S. At issue is whether Musk has over-sold the capability of his systems by using the name Autopilot or telling customers that “Full Self-Driving” will be available this year. “Elon’s been totally irresponsible,” said Alain Kornhauser, faculty chair of autonomous vehicle engineering at Princeton University. Musk, he said, has sold the dream that the cars can drive themselves even though in the fine print Tesla says they’re not ready. “It’s not a game. This is serious stuff.” Tesla, which has disbanded its media relations office, also did not respond to requests for comment Monday. Its stock fell 3.4% in the face of publicity about the crash. In December, before former President Donald Trump left office, NHTSA sought public comment on regulations. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, whose department included NHTSA, said the proposal would address safety “without hampering innovation in development of automated driving systems.” Also read: NTSB releases details in 2 crashes involving Tesla Autopilot But her replacement under President Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, indicated before Congress that change might be coming. “I would suggest that the policy framework in the U.S. has not really caught up with the technology platforms,” he said last month. “So we intend to pay a lot of attention for that and do everything we can within our authorities,” he said, adding that the agency may work with Congress on the issue. Tesla has had serious problems with Autopilot, which has been involved in several fatal crashes where it failed to stop for tractor-trailers crossing in front of it, stopped emergency vehicles, or a highway barrier. The NTSB, which can only issue recommendations, asked that NHTSA and Tesla limit the system to roads on which the system can safely operate, and that Tesla install a more robust system to monitor drivers to make sure they’re paying attention. Neither Tesla nor the agency took action, drawing criticism and blame for one of the crashes from the NTSB. Missy Cummings, an electrical and computer engineering professor at Duke University who studies automated vehicles, said the Texas crash is a watershed moment for NHTSA. She’s not optimistic the agency will do anything substantial, but hopes the crash will bring change. “Tesla has had such a free pass for so long,” she said. Frank Borris, a former head of NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation who now runs a safety consulting business, said the agency is in a tough position because of a slow, outdated regulatory process that can’t keep up with fast-developing technology. The systems holds great promise to improve safety, Borris said. But it’s also working with “what is an antiquated regulatory rule promulgating process which can take years.” Investigators in the Houston-area case haven’t determined how fast the Tesla was driving at the time of the crash, but Harris County Precinct Four Constable Mark Herman said it was a high speed. He would not say if there was evidence that anyone tampered with Tesla’s system to monitor the driver, which detects force from hands on the wheel. The system will issue warnings and eventually shut the car down if it doesn’t detect hands. But critics say Tesla’s system is easy to fool and can take as long as a minute to shut down. The company has said in the past that drivers using Autopilot and the company’s “Full Self-Driving Capability” system must be ready to intervene at any time, and that neither system can drive the cars itself. On Sunday, Musk tweeted that the company had released a safety report from the first quarter showing that Tesla with Autopilot has nearly a 10 times lower chance of crashing than the average vehicle with a human piloting it. But Kelly Funkhouser, head of connected and automated vehicle testing for Consumer Reports, said Tesla’s numbers have been inaccurate in the past and are difficult to verify without underlying data. “You just have to take their word for it,” Funkhouser said, adding that Tesla doesn’t say how many times the system failed but didn’t crash, or when a driver failed to take over. Funkhouser said it’s time for the government to step in, set performance standards and draw a line between partially automated systems that require drivers to intervene and systems that can drive themselves. “There is no metric, there is no yes or no, black or white,” she said. She fears that Tesla is asserting that it’s not a testing autonomous vehicles or putting self-driving cars on the road, while “getting away with using the general population of Tesla owners as guinea pigs to test the system.”