Pearl Freier

Founder of Cambridge BioPartners, Inc.

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

New Journal of Clinical Oncology @JCO_ASCO paper estimated potential savings of $661.8M for US taxpayer-funded Medicare if replace current Medicare Part D median formulary prices w/ @costplusdrugs pricing for 7 generic oncology drugs. https://t.co/I5z2Sb4OUw h/t @RuchikaTalwarMD

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@anshulkundaje @fordycelab cc'ing @FoundationOAI

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@eperlste Do you support the ban or are you in the third camp--supporting FDA reforms that would help rare disease patients participate in more US clinical trials with occasional collaboration with China

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@bradloncar Whoa.

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

A list of the 15 patient advocacy & rare disease organizations meeting with the FDA today:

[Nyah Phengsitthy @nyahphengsitthy]

1/ Groups to meet with FDA this afternoon:

Cure Sanfilippo Foundation
Cystic Fibrosis Foundation
EveryLife Foundation for Rare Diseases
Foundation for Angelman Syndrome Therapeutics
Friedreich's Ataxia Research Alliance
Friends of Cancer Research
Global Genes
Haystack Project

[Charles Brenner, PhD @CharlesMBrenner]

more people should know about this

also, it's striking that the "anti-aging" effect of shingrix was not anticipated by this highly targeted antiviral--this did not emerge from the geroscience hypothesis but rather from ppl targeting varicella zoster

[Jeff Cranmer @jeff_cranmer]

Biopharma companies, investors and patient advocates have grounds for believing that @US_FDA decisions under Makary, Prasad that appeared final a few months ago may be reversed, says @steveusdin1 https://t.co/soTo7BFeU4

[Rachel Tobac @RachelTobac]

Many are saying their IGs are still getting hacked using the Meta AI Support Assistant exploit.
Meta claims this was patched but that doesn't seem to accurate.
Please Meta, turn off the Meta AI Support Assistant and help folks recover their accounts before this gets even worse.

[Joe Weisenthal @TheStalwart]

Holy crap. On the eve of the IPO, SpaceX employees are organizing! ✊✊✊https://t.co/fghxmDQEeu

[Lukasz Olejnik @lukOlejnik]

The first cyberattack in history using prompt injection. Attackers used Meta’s chatbot as a tool to take over Instagram accounts belonging to well-known people, brands, and institutions. By manipulating Meta’s AI support system, they convinced it to perform a critical administrative operation: changing or adding an email address associated with the victim’s account.

Basic mistake: using LLM as a security boundary.

The attacker contacted Meta’s bot, provided the username of the account they wanted to take over, and asked it to link that account to a new email address controlled by the attacker. In practice, this meant that the person controlling the new email address could receive or provide the confirmation code, and then use the modified recovery channel to reset the password and take over the account.

AI support became a path for bypassing account security. If a chatbot can change an email address or initiate account recovery without independent verification of the owner, the attacker does not need to know the password or break through traditional security controls. It is sufficient to convince the automated support operator to perform an operation that the attacker should not normally be allowed to request.

https://t.co/Uy5DdWudJh

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@zavaindar Congrats!

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

Meta had delegated account security and recovery functions to an AI chatbot according to reports. https://t.co/DFpROSObL3

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

Google built a tool last year to defend against a call spoofing + AI voice clone attack. More below. Meta's AI support chatbot was exploited by hackers to take over IG accounts.

[Rachel Tobac @RachelTobac]

WHOA @Google let me know they saw my tweet below last year & built a tool to defend against this exact call spoofing + AI voice clone attack!
As of today, fake call detection on Android alerts when someone is impersonating your contact.
Demo & thread of how it catches attackers:

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

I don't know if this related but I remember reports that comp packages for a few new AI employees last year were $250M for 4 years per new hire. So they laid off most of the cybersecurity employees?

[rat king 🐀 @MikeIsaac]

we're on like day four of this. what's going on over there?

[Jane Manchun Wong @wongmjane]

Update: My four-letter username finsta has also been hacked.

(even though it also has two-factor auth turned on)

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@jacobkimmel @newlimit @foundersfund @ThriveCapital @Greenoaks Congrats Jacob!

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

In cases where early disclosure of a US invention creates an outsized risk of imitation, Scott Gottlieb wrote that Congress could allow inventors to "request a short delay in a patent publication. A longer runway would allow U.S. firms to advance new drugs to patients before others capitalize on the filings."

[Scott Gottlieb, MD 🇺🇸 @ScottGottliebMD]

China's new rules require approval before Chinese tech is transferred overseas. But U.S. drug tech is open for Chinese firms to parse for molecular leads that are quickly turned into competing medicine. Knowledge flows in one direction: into China not out
https://t.co/IC3hhficC9

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

@CharlesMBrenner Wow. Congratulations Charles!

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

FDA has lost thousands of medical reviewers since '25. Oncology div had 100 medical reviewers before HHS Secretary Kennedy was sworn in. Now they're down to ~50 said ex FDA Commissioner Gottlieb on CBS 5/10/26 #ASCO26 #ASCO2026 Hematology team for leukemia & lymphoma drugs: was 21 & down to 6. Entire breast cancer review team was eliminated Gottlieb said. The video from the Gottlieb interview on 5/10 is below & see 5 min mark

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

Here's the video from Sunday 5/10/26 interview w/ex FDA Commissioner Gottlieb on Face the Nation/CBS https://t.co/HMfcJnfGp6. Discussion of loss of thousands of medical reviewers begins at 5 min mark $XBI $IB $BBC cc'ing @BloodCancerUtd @CancerResearch

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

Below is the clip on Face The Nation on 5/10 when ex FDA Commissioner explained the current staffing situaton at the FDA: https://t.co/Cl0UKhMmfA

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

FDA has lost thousands of medical reviewers since '25. Oncology division had 100 medical reviewers before HHS Secretary Kennedy was sworn in. Now they're down to ~50 said ex FDA Commissioner Gottlieb on CBS 5/10/26: $XBI $IBB $BBC

[Pearl Freier @PearlF]

Innovation Review Voucher is a good idea & could have worked at FDA to make US companies more competitive. Can it work w/ current FDA when 1000s of medical reviewers have left since '25 h/t Gottlieb on CBS 5/10 & 50% of oncology is gone he said #ASCO26 $XBI. Takes 1-2 yrs to train to get them up to speed. Oncology division had 100 medical reviewers before HHS Secretary Kennedy was sworn in. Now they're down to ~50 said ex FDA Commissioner Gottlieb on Face The Nation

[Robert Nelsen @rtnarch]

We need an Innovation Review Voucher, where a USA innovator (not others) can apply, based on their innovation in a drug category or molecule, for super fast regulatory approval, AND a transferable and subdividable 3 year commercial exclusivity, which covers the structure and close derivatives.

Applications would be 90 day decisions, with a standard that a reasonable person would conclude that the technology was used or copied by the entity. In practice, this should prevent USA innovation from being decimated via less funding flowing in (which hurts patients in the long run), and if the commercial delay is critically important the vouchers are tradeable, and can be granted to more than one party at the discretion of the holder, so patients are protected.

Prob have like ARPA H like structure or some new DOC panel to do it.