The Center for Public Integrity reportsthat a senior journalist at ABC News served as a confidential informant to the FBI in the mid-1990′s.

In the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing, ABC News received a tip that Iraq was behind the terrorist attack. The FBI got the ABC reporter to reveal their source, and proceeded to add them to the bureau’s informant database.

“If true, it would certainly be of grave concern to us that the FBI would have created an informant file based on information gleaned from a reporter,” [ABC spokesperson Jeffrey] Schneider said. “It certainly would be very troubling for the FBI to recruit a news employee as a confidential source.

“It can create a perception of collusion between the government and the news organization. It would put journalists everywhere at risk if people believed that journalists are acting as government agents. And it could raise the specter of the government trying to spy on a news organization,” he added.