Commissioner Andrew Colvin says the journalist’s metadata, but not the content of telephone calls, was accessed during an investigation into a leakAustralian federal police have admitted an officer unlawfully accessed a journalist’s call records held under the government’s controversial metadata retention regime. The AFP commissioner, Andrew Colvin, fronted media in Canberra to admit the breach on Friday afternoon, saying it involved the unlawful accessing of a journalist’s metadata. Malcolm Turnbull says access to journalists' metadata 'a special case' Read more“Put simply, this was human error,” Colvin said. “It was a mistake that was not picked up and corrected before it occurred by our internal practices and procedures.”Police are required to obtain a warrant when accessing the metadata of journalists. “The use of journalist’s metadata to identify confidential sources is an attempt to go after whistleblowers and others who reveal government stuff-ups.”

Source: The Guardian April 28, 2017 05:54 UTC