WASHINGTON: The US government has used satellites to spy on American citizens, collecting the exact contents of every digital communication in the country, former National Security Agency analyst Russell Tice has said.
“The United States was, at that time, using satellites to spy on American citizens. At that time, it was news organizations, the State Department, including Colin Powell, and an awful lot of senior military people and industrial types,” Tice said in an interview.
“This was in 2002-2003 time frame. The NSA was targeting individuals. In that case, they were judges like the Supreme Court. I held in my hand Judge Alito’s targeting information for his phones and his staff and his family,” Tice added.
Tice, who worked as an analyst of the agency for two decades, also noted that he was fired in 2005 after asking Congress to provide greater protection to whistleblowers.
