Others challenged that assertion, saying that if the CIA had disseminated its formal report, it would have drawn far more attention than raw, unhighlighted data and could have prompted analysts to link the intercepts of the Al Qaeda leaders in Yemen with the information provided by Abdulmutallab's father.
If they had linked the two pieces of information, authorities might have flagged Abdulmutallab as a serious threat.
Instead, his name was added to a general threat database of 550,000 names that is not cross-checked with other databases. And Abdulmutallab was allowed to board Flight 253.
