Dan Goodin reports:
A New York City Police Department sergeant has admitted he illegally obtained a name contained in an FBI terrorist watchlist and gave it to an acquaintance to use in a child custody case.
Haytham Khalil, pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor charge stemming from the unauthorized access and dissemination of information from the FBI’s National Crime Information Center (NCIC). The database contains information from the agency’s terrorist screening center identifying individuals listed on a terrorist watchlist.
According to documents filed in federal court in Manhattan, Khalil lacked the authority to access the information, so he used a fellow cop’s username and password to gain entry. Remarkably, the fellow officer left his credentials on a notepad so his co-workers could access the system when he wasn’t around.
Read more in The Register