WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former CIA Director John Deutch used a home computer that contained sensitive information to access the Internet, a CIA report concluded, raising fears that secrets stored on the machine could have been stolen.

The information came in a classified report from the CIA's inspector general. The revelations raised red flags with CIA investigators trying to figure out whether any secrets stored on the unsecured computer could have been accessed and stolen.

Officials say Deutch had an account with America Online that he used to access the Internet. Informed officials told CNN that he once received an unsolicited e-mail from a former Russian scientist on the computer, which was crammed with top-secret materials.

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The sources say at one point, he received incoming e-mail from a western European country from someone who identified himself as a former Russian scientist: The sources say Deutch did not respond, but that the contact alarmed CIA computer security officials.

Deutch was stripped of his top security clearance in August by current Director George Tenet. Tenet said Wednesday that there was no evidence Deutch's home computer had been hacked into by international adversaries -- but neither was there any sure way to tell that it hadn't been.

Tenet is under fire because the CIA failed to notify congressional oversight committees and the Department of Justice for almost a year after the security breach was discovered.

"It's very disturbing to me and I think it was to other people in the intelligence community, why Dr. Deutch did as he did," Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Alabama, said after a closed-door meeting with Tenet.

"I'm not sure, but it's unusual, it's strange, it should not have happened," Shelby added. Nevada Democrat Richard Bryan, the committee's vice chairman, called it "reckless by someone who knows better."

Both senators said the agency was wrong for not acting sooner on the matter. The Justice Department investigated the matter, but decided against prosecution.

National Security Correspond David Ensor contributed to this report.