After accusations of two of its employees spying for Saudi Arabia .. What was collected? And how Twitter defended itself?

After the official US accusations of two former Twitter employees of spying for Saudi Arabia, the US company found itself in an unenviable position, especially in light of the censorship and audits recently imposed by US lawmakers on major social media companies.

The US Department of Justice has accused US citizen Ahmed Abu Amo and Saudi citizen Ali al-Zubara, two former employees of Tension, of working for Saudi Arabia by exploiting the company's internal systems to collect sensitive and publicly available information to reveal the identities of Saudi account holders known to criticize the Saudi government and thousands of other users. Twitter.

The Ministry of Justice also accused a third Saudi national, Ahmed al-Mutairi, of mediating between Saudi officials and Twitter employees.

While Abu Amo was arrested, the other two were believed to be in Saudi Arabia, and a federal warrant for their arrest was issued.

What was collected?
According to the 27-page criminal complaint, Twitter employees monitored the targeted Twitter accounts in 2015 and left the company later that year.

The most prominent role of Zubara, who worked as a web engineer in Twitter, where he reached - according to the complaint - to the data of more than six thousand users, and because of his job in the company was able to access the IP addresses (IP) of the target users, in addition to Their email addresses and phone numbers, and record all their actions on the platform at any specific time, according to the Ministry of Justice.

Abu Amo was a media partnership manager on Twitter, accused of falsifying documents and making false statements to the FBI.

Twitter response
Certainly, these accusations of Twitter employees will renew demands to verify the ability of technology companies to protect the privacy of their users, what was the company's response?

Following the news, the US micro-blogging company said in a statement that it was aware of the extent to which bad actors would go to try to undermine its service.

`` We understand the amazing risks faced by many who use Twitter to share their views with the world and hold those in power accountable.We have tools in place to protect their privacy and their ability to do their vital work.We are committed to protecting those who use our service to defend equality, individual freedoms and human rights. ''