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The Federal Bureau has used drones for surveillance in limited cases over US soil, FBI Director Robert Mueller has told a US Senate committee.

Robert Mueller said the agency had “very few” drones and had used them in “a very minimal way” and “very seldom”.

But the director said the FBI was in the “initial stages” of developing drone policies.

In May, President Barack Obama said he would curtail the use of armed drones in operations outside the US.

Under the new policy described by the White House, the US will only allow drones to be used in areas that are not overt war zones when there was a “continuing, imminent threat” to the US and capture was not feasible.

Robert Mueller has told a US Senate committee the FBI has used drones for surveillance in limited cases over US soil

Robert Mueller has told a US Senate committee the FBI has used drones for surveillance in limited cases over US soil

Wednesday’s acknowledgment that the US federal investigative service has also used drones comes as the nation debates electronic surveillance following the recent disclosure of massive internet and telephone data snooping programmes.

Robert Mueller, who is retiring in July after 12 years as FBI director, described the drone use in testimony in a hearing of the US Senate judiciary committee.

“I will tell you that our footprint is very small,” he said.

He said drones were used in “particular incidents where you need the capability” but said he was unsure how long images captured by the drones were kept.

A surveillance drone was used during a February stand-off with an Alabama man who shot dead a school bus driver and then took a five-year-old boy hostage, according to media reports at the time.

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Iran has begun building a copy of RQ-170 Sentinel, the US surveillance drone it captured last year, after breaking its encryption codes, Tehran officials say.

“The Americans should be aware to what extent we have infiltrated the plane,” General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, military aerospace chief said.

The RQ-170 Sentinel was shown on Iranian state television last December.

Tehran says it was brought down using electronic warfare; Washington says it malfunctioned.

US Senator Joe Lieberman dismissed the claim that a copy was being made as “Iranian bluster” saying, “they’re on the defensive because of our economic sanctions against them”.

Iran has begun building a copy of RQ-170 Sentinel, the US surveillance drone it captured last year, after breaking its encryption codes

Iran has begun building a copy of RQ-170 Sentinel, the US surveillance drone it captured last year, after breaking its encryption codes

But Gen Hajizadeh said: “Our experts have full understanding of its components and programmes.”

He said that Iran had managed to hack the controls of the drone, thus enabling the Iranians to reverse-engineer the aircraft to make its own copy.

US officials have previously asked for the drone to be returned but Iran has refused, saying that the US should instead apologize for invading Iranian air space.

Washington has long said that Iran will find it hard to exploit any data and technology aboard it because of measures taken to limit the intelligence value of drones operating over hostile territory.

Although analysts believe lessons could certainly be learnt about how the machine was put together, reverse-engineering has generally been seen by experts as beyond Iran’s capability.

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