Can federal files be accessed to snoop on political candidates?

Is it possible for federal files to be accessed in order to snoop on political candidates?  One certainly might hope that the answer would be no, but unfortunately certain events from the last election cycle point to yes. 

Namely, in 2007 both Barack Obama’s (currently Senator at the time) and Hillary Clinton’s (also Senator) passport files were breached by someone, likely within the State Department. 

And this was after a similar breech occurred in 1992 with Bill Clinton’s passport, a breech that was supposedly resolved by having systems put into place that would send notifications out when a high profile individual’s passport information was accessed. 

Attorney Kendall Coffey responded to MSNBC at the time, arguing that “the idea confidential federal files can be accessed for snooping on political candidates… would be an utter cancer in our system.” 

Such information can be incredibly damaging, especially if the person who accessed the files wanted to cause political damage to a candidate.  Hopefully the State Department is keeping a tighter lid on their files this time around.