National Security Agency (NSA) whistleblower Edward Snowden joined Twitter Tuesday morning. Immediately thousands of people started following him.

Snowden's first tweet was sent at 12 p.m. ET. It read, "Can you hear me now?"

Less than a half hour after that tweet, over 30,000 people had already started following Snowden. Snowden's account has the blue check mark, which means he has been verified by Twitter as being the true owner of the account.

Twitter's co-founder Jack Dorsey replied to Snowden's tweet by saying, "Yes! Welcome to Twitter!"

Just four days ago, Snowden expressed concerns about joining a social network like Twitter in an interview with Fusion. Snowden says websites like Twitter and Facebook keep analytics on its members like how long members visit a page, what photos they click on and more. Snowden says this information is stored in their servers permanently. Snowden did suggest he could join a social network in the near future.

Snowden came into the international spotlight when he exposed thousands of pages of classified NSA documents to journalists and media outlets. He is wanted for charges of espionage and theft of government property but has remained in Russia. He is unable to travel to the United States because his passport was taken from him.

Less than an hour into his Twitter membership, Snowden had gathered almost 100,000 followers and sent out his second tweet.

Snowden's Twitter biography reads, "I used to work for the government. Now I work for the public. Director at @FreedomPress."

Snowden's Twitter handle is @Snowden.