[LINK] More Murdoch company hacking - Sky news

Fri Apr 6 10:39:19 AEST 2012

UK's Sky News: We hacked in the public interest

http://www.9news.com/money/261040/75/UKs-Sky-News-We-hacked-in-the-public-interest

10:49 AM, Apr 5, 2012

LONDON (AP) - Rupert Murdoch's Sky News channel twice authorized its 
reporters to hack into computers, a potentially embarrassing 
revelation that could further dent the media tycoon's hope of 
acquiring full control over satellite broadcaster BSkyB.

Sky News said in a statement Thursday that in one case it broke into 
emails belonging to Anne and John Darwin, the so-called "canoe 
couple" who became notorious in Britain after the latter faked his 
own death in a boating accident as part of an elaborate insurance 
scam. The circumstances surrounding the second case weren't made clear.

Sky News acknowledged intercepting the canoe couple's emails, but 
said the material was later handed to police and insisted it had done 
nothing wrong.

"We stand by these actions as editorially justified and in the public 
interest. We do not take such decisions lightly or frequently," Sky 
News chief John Ryley said in a statement.

He noted that, in a 2004 investigation, a Sky News journalists had 
bought an Uzi submachine gun to illustrate the availability of banned 
weapons in Britain. In 2003, a reporter sneaked into a restricted 
area at London's Heathrow Airport to highlight security failings.

"These investigations serve the public interest and are a legitimate 
part of responsible journalism," Ryley said.

Shares in BSkyB fell about 2.8 percent following the news to 639 
pence ($10.11).

A media frenzy was kicked off when John Darwin - long thought to have 
died in a boating accident in the North Sea - walked into a London 
police station in late 2007 and said: "I think I'm a missing person."

He claimed to have amnesia and said he could remember nothing since 
2000, but his story unraveled as journalists and police started 
digging into his background.

Sky News didn't identify which of its stories was the result of 
hacking, but in an article dated July 21, 2008, journalist Gerard 
Tubb said the channel had uncovered documentary evidence showing that 
John Darwin had decided to come back to England because he was having 
trouble staying in Panama.

"We discovered an email," the article begins, without giving any 
explanation of how the message was obtained. Sky declined to make 
Tubb or Ryley available for interviews.

The company's public interest defense immediately drew skepticism 
from British legal experts.

David Allen Green, media lawyer at Preiskel & Co., said that there 
was no such thing as a public interest defense as far as Britain's 
Computer Misuse Act was concerned.

"It is not possible for the editor of any news organization to 
authorize criminal acts," said Green, who's been a frequent critic 
Murdoch's News Corp.

Britain's Crown Prosecution Service can decide, however, that it 
wouldn't serve the public interest to file charges.

"As Sky News took the hacked emails to the police themselves, it 
appears that any prosecution was decided not to be in public 
interest," Green said in a message posted to Twitter.

Sky's email hacking, first reported in Britain's Guardian newspaper, 
could be a further headache for Murdoch. His international media 
empire has spent the better part of a year in the spotlight over 
widespread illegal behavior at his now-defunct News of the World 
tabloid, where journalists routinely hacked into public figures' 
phones in an effort to win scoops.

News Corp. owns a 39.1 percent stake in BSkyB, which owns Sky News, 
and Murdoch was forced to abandon a potentially lucrative bid for 
full control of the broadcaster after the phone hacking scandal 
boiled over in July.

The scandal has increasingly embroiled BSkyB and Murdoch's son James 
- the broadcaster's chairman until earlier this week.

James, the former head of his father's British newspaper division, 
has long insisted that he knew nothing of the widespread wrongdoing 
at the News of the World. With that claim coming under increasing 
scrutiny, the 39-year-old stepped down Tuesday in a move to insulate 
BSkyB from the scandal.

Opposition lawmaker Chris Bryant, whose own phone was hacked by the 
News of the World, said he was writing to BSkyB to ask when the 
company's board members knew about the hacking.

"Is this why James left?" Bryant asked on Twitter.

In a separate development, a person close to the case said that News 
of the World publisher News International was challenging celebrity 
phone hacking victim Sienna Miller over the size of her legal bill.

Miller won 100,000 pounds (about $160,000) from News International 
last year after the company admitted eavesdropping on her phone 
messages, but there's been no agreement on legal costs and the issue 
is headed to court, the person said. He spoke anonymously because the 
information wasn't cleared for release.

News International spokeswoman Daisy Dunlop declined comment, as did 
Miller's lawyer, Mark Thomson.

The phone hacking scandal has already cost News Corp. nearly $200 
million, much of it in legal and consulting fees.

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit at janwhitaker.com
blog: http://janwhitaker.com/jansblog/
business: http://www.janwhitaker.com

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