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Trump won't give up his Twitter phone long enough for a security check

Team Trump says advancements in security tech make the phone less vulnerable to hacking, but experts aren’t convinced

Donald Trump is so attached to his Twitter phone that he refuses to get it swapped out every month, despite warnings from just about every experienced security official out there.

While former President Barack Obama submitted his phone for security checks every month, President Trump has reportedly gone five months without sending his phone in for a security checkup, according to a report from Politico. Trump carries around two phones with him — both iPhones, with one that only makes calls and another that has only the Twitter app and a handful of news websites loaded onto it. Trump’s call-capable phones are swapped out every month or so, but his Twitter phone, he holds onto, Politico reported.

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Phones are vulnerable to hacking by both domestic and foreign interests. Should a hacker get access to Trump’s phone and his Twitter account, through which he reaches his millions of Twitter followers and the media, which hangs on every word he posts, it could pose a serious threat to national security.

And of course we know how much Trump relies on social media: He’s fired advisers in tweets and written openly about sensitive diplomatic issues, like negotiations with North Korea over the recluse nation’s nuclear disarmament plans.

The phone (or phones) that Trump uses to make calls also have cameras and microphones on them, which Obama’s phones did not. The Trump team says that advancements in security technology mean that these phones are less vulnerable to hacking than Obama’s were during his presidency, but security experts aren’t convinced. Leaving the camera and mic hardware on the phone means those devices could, in theory, be hacked and activated remotely, allowing cyber intruders to listen in on the president’s private conversations.

“Foreign adversaries seeking intelligence about the U.S. are relentless in their pursuit of vulnerabilities in our government’s communications networks, and there is no more sought-after intelligence target than the president of the United States,” Nate Jones, former director of counterterrorism on the National Security Council in the Obama administration and the founder of Culper Partners, a consulting firm, told Politico.

And Trump sharply criticized his opponent in the 2016 presidential race, Hillary Clinton, for her use of a private email server while she served as Secretary of State that Trump said left her vulnerable to cyberattacks. Trump also pointed to the server as evidence that she was conducting Clinton Foundation business through the State Department.

"I thought using one device would be simpler, and obviously, it hasn't worked out that way," Clinton said about the use of an email server set up at her Chappaqua home rather than a government-hosted server.

Sounds like, on the convenience of using one phone, Trump and HIllary agree.