Alonso implicated in Formula One spy scandal

Reigning world champion Fernando Alonso has been fully implicated in the Formula One spy scandal.

The FIA has fined Alonso's McLaren team $100 million (£49.5 million) and stripped the team of all contructors championship points for the season.

McLaren have never denied their chief engineer Mike Coughlan had information about their rivals Ferrari, but they insist that information was at Coughlan's home and the team was not involved.

However, the FIA has revealed the second hearing held by the World Motor Sport Council showed Alonso and McLaren test driver Pedro de la Rosa had received emails containing confidential information.

In their 15-page judgment, the FIA said: "The emails show unequivocally that both Mr Alonso and Mr de la Rosa received confidential Ferrari information via Coughlan.

"Both drivers knew that this information was confidential Ferrari information and both knew that the information was being received by Coughlan from Nigel Stepney."

Coughlan was suspended from his position on July 3, the same day Ferrari sacked Stepney as their head of performance development.

It is understood Stepney forwarded a 780-page technical dossier to Coughlan, an accusation the former continues to deny.

But one email exchange between de la Rosa and Alonso dated March 25, 2007, is particularly damning.

It initially relates to the weight distribution of Ferrari's cars as set up for the Australian Grand Prix on March 18.

De la Rosa then wrote: "All the information from Ferrari is very reliable.

"It comes from Nigel Stepney, their former chief mechanic - I don't know what post he holds now.

"He's the same person who told us in Australia that Kimi Raikkonen was stopping on lap 18.

"He's very friendly with Mike Coughlan, our chief designer, and he told him that."

© Independent Television News Limited 2007. All rights reserved.