Edward Snowden joins Twitter, immediately starts following the NSA

If the NSAever wants to get in touch with famed whistleblowerEdward Snowden, it can do so viadirect messageon Twitter a privilege that is theirs and theirs alone.

Snowdenofficially joined Twitter earlyTuesday afternoon as a verified user with the handle @Snowden.

His first tweet, sent at 12 p.m. ET, reads, "Can you hear me now?"His Twitter biostates simply"I used to work for the government. Now I work for the public. Director at @FreedomofPress."

The account's location is unspecified.

To date, Snowden is following only one other Twitter account:TheU.S.National Security Agency's @NSAGov.

Hisfollower count, on the other hand, has been explodingsince @Snowdenwent live. Just one hour afterthe former NSA contractor issued his first tweet, more than 170,000 people were following him on Twitter.

However,@NSAGov is not one of those followers.

Snowden's presence drew the ire of former New York Gov. George Pataki, who is running a campaign for president that has failed to gain much traction. Pataki called on Twitter co-founder and interim CEO Jack Dorsey to remove the controversial Snowden.

According to the Intercept, Snowden may have been inspired to join Twitter by another public figure and social media rock star in his own right Neil deGrasse Tyson.

"You kind of need a Twitter handle. So like @Snowden, maybe? Is this something you might do?" Tyson asked Snowden during an interview published by StarTalk RadioFriday evening.

"That sounds good, I think we've got to make it it happen," Snowdensaid, to which Tyson replied, "You and I will be Twitter buddies.Your followers will be: the internet, me, and the NSA."

Snowden's second and third tweets, bothpublic replies to Tyson,showthat theastrophysicistwasn't kidding about theTwitter buddy thing.

Snowden has been living in Russia since 2013, whenhe leaked classified documents revealingthat the U.S. government had top-secretmass surveillance programs in place tospy on almost everything that hundreds of millions of people do online.

The whistleblower iswanted by the U.S. government on espionage charges, butcontinues to make press appearances using video links fromRussia, where he has beengranted asylum.

Snowden's lawyer, Ben Wizner of the American Civil Liberties Union, told the Intercept thatSnowdenhimselfwill be controlling his Twitter account.

The@Snowden handle, while already registered to another user, hadn't been in use forthree years when Snowden decided to join the social network. Twitter helped him obtain the handle, and verified it right away.