(CNN) — As the country was sinking into its worst financial crisis in more than 70 years, Security and Exchange Commission employees
and contractors cruised porn sites and viewed sexually explicit
pictures using government computers, according to an agency report
obtained by CNN.
“During the past five years, the SEC OIG (Office of Inspector General) substantiated that 33 SEC employees and or
contractors violated Commission rules and policies, as well as the
government-wide Standards of Ethical Conduct, by viewing pornographic,
sexually explicit or sexually suggestive images using government
computer resources and official time,” said a summary of the
investigation by the inspector general’s office.
More than half of the workers made between $99,000 and $223,000. All the cases took
place over the past five years.
The inspector general’s report includes specific examples of misuse by employees.
A regional office staff accountant tried to access pornographic Web sites nearly
1,800 times, using her SEC laptop during a two-week period. She
also had about 600 pornographic images saved on the hard drive of her
laptop.
Separately, a senior attorney at SEC headquarters admitted to downloading pornography up to eight hours a day, according
to the investigation.
“In fact, this attorney downloaded so much pornography to his government computer that he exhausted the available
space on the computer hard drive and downloaded pornography to CDs or
DVDs that he accumulated in boxes in his office,” the inspector
general’s report said..
“It is nothing short of disturbing that high-ranking officials within the SEC were spending more time looking at
pornography than taking action to help stave off the events that
brought our nation’s economy to the brink of collapse,” said Rep.
Darrell Issa. The Republican is a ranking member of the House Committee
on Oversight and Government Reform.
“This stunning report should make everyone question the wisdom of moving forward with plans to give
regulators like the SEC even more widespread authority,” he said.
“Inexplicably, rather than exercise its existing regulatory enforcement
authority, SEC officials were preoccupied with other distractions.”
The investigation came to light on the same day President Obama gave a
speech in lower Manhattan, calling for reform in the finance industry.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate is working on a reform bill that would set up regulatory oversight of the financial industry’s practices with
the goal of preventing another Wall Street meltdown like the one in 2008
that launched the U.S. recession..
The bill includes an “early warning” system intended to spot signs of crisis, as well as a $50
billion liquidation fund created with money from banks and other finance
industry corporations to ensure an orderly transition in closing down
failing entities. It’s approved by the Senate’s Banking and Agricultural
committees.
The House passed its version of the bill in December.