WASHINGTON -- A second former State Department worker has pleaded guilty to illegally peeking at scores of confidential passport application files. 

Dwayne Cross admitted in federal court in Washington on Wednesday that from 2002 to 2007, he used a government database to view the passport applications of more than 150 celebrities, actors, musicians, politicians, athletes and personal friends. 

At the time, the 41-year-old Cross worked in the Bureau of Consular Affairs at the State Department. He pleaded guilty to one count of unauthorized computer access. 

Cross is the second ex-State Department worker to plead guilty to passport prying. In December, a former foreign service officer was sentenced to a year of probation. 

The issue of unauthorized peeping into private files came to light in March 2008, when authorities discovered contract passport workers had looked at the files of presidential candidates John McCain, Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Five contract workers were fired. 

A follow-up investigation found that 85 percent of the passport files for a sampling of 150 famous Americans had been accessed suspiciously often. 

The State Department maintains passport records for about 127 million Americans.