Fergie's Tech Blog

H-P Probed Third C|Net Reporter, Family

Ina Fried writes on C|Net News:

Hewlett-Packard thoroughly investigated a third CNET News.com reporter and his family as part of its controversial probe into unauthorized media leaks, News.com has learned.

According to a government investigator, the company pursued the home and cellular telephone records of reporter Stephen Shankland as well as those of his father and his wife, a former News.com reporter and current Associated Press correspondent. The company also obtained a yearbook photograph of Shankland's mother, a high school teacher, and attempted to find ties between board member George Keyworth and Shankland's father, a semi-retired geophysicist. Shankland's father, Thomas Shankland, and George Keyworth both worked for some years at New Mexico's Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Although HP has said that investigators targeted the records of Stephen Shankland, the latest revelations indicate the aggressive tactics and the lengths to which investigators went in their effort to tie Keyworth to media reports. Keyworth, who stepped down from the board last week, said in a press release that he was a source for a January News.com story.

posted by Fergie @ 9/21/2006 07:40:00 PM