Guide Note
According to
NBC News, three contract employees of the State Department accessed
Senator Barack Obama's electronic passport records in January 2008. All three men were contracted with the
Bureau of Consular Affairs, which handles passport information. The contract employees accessed Obama's passport application and personal records. According to a department official, NBC News reports, when employees access the records of a high-profile individual, it alerts a monitoring system. The official added, "When the monitoring system is tripped, we immediately seek an explanation for the records accessed. If the explanation is not satisfactory, the supervisor is notified." State Department spokesman Sean McCormack explains the contract employees' motivation, "as far as we can tell...it was imprudent curiosity." Spokesperson for the Obama campaign Bill Burton insists on a "complete investigation."
Fast Facts
- Who: Three employees of the State Department
- What: Accessed Senator Barack Obama's passport files
- When: January, 2008
- Two employees have been fired and one has been disciplined
- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that the security measures "worked properly" in this case
- The breaches occurred three dates: January 9, 2008, February 21, 2008 and March 14, 2008
- Names to know: Bill Burton, spokesman for Obama's presidential campaign, Sean McCormack, spokesman for the State Department.
- Burton called for a complete investigation into who looked at the file, why they looked at the file and why it took so long for the department to reveal the breach
- McCormack said that senior management became aware of this information on the afternoon of March 20, 2008, the same day they shared the information with Obama's Senate Office.
