Oops — passport numbers of world leaders sent to wrong email address

A clerk in the Australian immigration division accidentally emailed the wrong personal details of world leaders, including US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

According to a report in The Guardian, the clerk emailed the personal details of leaders who attended the G20 summit in Brisbane in November last year to the organizing committee of the Asian Cup football competition, which was held in Australia early this year.

The following information was emailed: the name, place of birth, job, nationality, passport number and visa number of Obama, Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Apparently the clerk used Microsoft Outlook and started typing an email address, but did not notice the auto-complete function completed the email address of the incorrect name.

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