CNBC hires judge to investigate Million Dollar Portfolio challenge

The following state was issued by CNBC late Friday:

“We have hired Judge Stanley Sporkin (U.S. District Court Judge, Ret.), the former Director of the Division of Enforcement for the Securities and Exchange Commission. Judge Sporkin is investigating whether one or more contestants engaged in illegal market manipulation to affect actual prices represented in their contest portfolios.

“A member of the Freeh Group International, a group of former federal judges and senior FBI officials who provide legal, investigation, and risk management services, Judge Sporkin also served as General Counsel of the CIA for five years.

“In addition, CNBC retained two independent leading consultants in the information security industry to investigate whether one or more contestants wrote and executed computer program scripts to bypass the contestâ€™s security measures. The consultants are Neohaspsis and Symantec.

“As previously stated, the integrity of the contest will drive this process, and we anticipate meeting the date of July 8, 2007 contained in the rules. However, we will not declare a winner until the investigations are complete.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.