Two former Twitter employees and a third man wer🍌e charged in San Francisco Federal Court with spying on Twitter users cr♑itical of the Saudi royal family, the US Justice Department has announced.
The two Saudi citizens and one US citizen allegedly worked t🌊ogether to unmask the ownership details behind dissident Twitter accounts on behalf of the 𒁃government in Riyadh and the royal family, the department said on Wednesday.
According to a court filing, t🏅hey were guided by an unnamed Saudi official who worked for someone prosecutors designated "Royal Family Member-1," which The Washington Post reported was Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Those charged were Twitter employees Ali Alzabarah and Ahmad Abouammo, along withไ Ahmed Almutairi, a marketing official with ties to the royal family.
"The criminal complaint unsealed today alleges that Saudi agent𓆉s mined Twitter's internal systems for personal information about known Saudi critics and thousands of other Twit💫ter users," said US Attorney David Anderson.
"US law protects US companies from such an unlawful foreign intr༺usion. We will not allow US companies or US technology to become tools of foreign repression in violation of U꧂S law," he said in a statement.
The lawsuit comes as𝄹 US-Saudi relations continue to suffer strains over the brutal, Riyadh-sanctioned murder one year ago of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote for, am💦ong others, The Washington Post.
A critic of Crown Prince Mohജammed, Khashoggi was killed and dismembered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.
According to the Post, US ♌intelligence has concluded that the prince himself was closely linked t🔯o the murder.
(AFP)
