News of the World Hacking Scandal

[Doogie Browser]

Jesus your man Hoare was on that Panorama special last night and he looked like a fat version of Shaun Ryder, very sad.  A lot of speculation Cameron could be gone this week too.

[take_yer_points]

Anyone watching the stream of the questioning from MPs on BBC? Someone seemed to attack Rupert Murdoch just as the last questions were starting to be asked and they've suspended the questioning now for 10 minutes - the BBC aren't showing it at all at the minute

[ExiledGael]

Did he actually get at him? Haven't seen it.
Guardian live feed saying Murdoch's wife Wendi slapped the intruder.

[take_yer_points]

Did he actually get at him? Haven't seen it.
Guardian live feed saying Murdoch's wife Wendi slapped the intruder.

No, I don't think so - within a few seconds of it happening the camera was on Murdoch and the intruder was away from him

[ExiledGael]

Just seen it online, God the wife or whoever that was didn't hold back. Diving at the intruder throwing a wild punch.
Made the son James look a bit useless, he just sat there shocked.

[Minder]

He looks like a wise boy.

[Puckoon]

any links?

[LostInSpace]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14207924

[johnneycool]

That's some cosy wee setup between the Cops, News International exec's and MP's of all persuasions.

Maybe I'm naive but why would the Met need 30 odd people employed in public relations type activities.

[Denn Forever]

They may have hacked people they were helping?  Could they not just ask?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-14332689

[deiseach]

Excellent article in The New Yorker giving the background to the phone-hacking fiasco. Particularly enjoyed this piece:

[Piers] Morgan's diary, published as "The Insider," in 2005, is a tour guide to the freakery of life among the red-tops. What stands out is not the crowing thrills, or the major foul-ups, but the run-of-the-mill assumptions on which the tabloid press relies; they are the secret of the Murdoch mill. In the News of the World, on November 13, 1994, Morgan ran a photograph of Spike Milligan, once a harebrained figure in British comedy and now, apparently, whittled to what the caption called "a shadow of his former self." The picture, it turned out, was not of Milligan at all, but, as Morgan reassured himself, "Spike will see the funny side, I'm sure. He's a comedian." Four days later, when a letter arrived from Milligan's lawyer, expressing a grievance and requesting compensation, Morgan wrote, "I genuinely cannot believe how prickly Spike is being over all this." Such is the quintessence of the tabloid: to bruise and bully, and then to back off, exclaiming, Come on, we're only having a laugh. Can't you take a joke? The British sense of humor is both an invaluable broadsword and an impenetrable shield.

[seafoid]

Some really sick stuff about the Uk tabloid press coming out at the Leveson inquiry

• Steve Coogan said he was subject of a "sociopathic sting" by then News of the World editor Andy Coulson. But he was tipped off by the paper's showbiz columnist Rav Singh who warned him that he was going to get a call to entrap him.
• Coogan said his life has been laid bare by the intrusion of the press. "My closet is empty of skeletons as a result of the press, so unwittingly they have made me immune in some ways".
• Glenn Mulcaire's notes contained details of Coogan's girlfriends, his account number, his bank transactions and his pin number. He suggested this was because someone was looking over his shoulder at a cash machine.
• Coogan's children were secretly photographed by paparazzi in Brighton. He caught the photographer; asked to see the photos, but he hid them from him. The photos were then published by the Sunday Times, Coogan claimed

Coogan continues about News of the World's Singh.

Rav Singh has own column and telephones him - said on the phone I want to help you, I begged him not to put in some of the more lurid details, he said if confirm certain aspects then more lurid details would be left out of the story. So I confirmed certain details and he gave me his word that more embarrassing part would be omitted. After that manager received phone call from Coulson that they were going to put everything in the paper.

2.28pm: Coogan has made a startling disclosure about an alleged sting by the News of the World. He was tipped off by showbiz reporter Rav Singh.
Rav Singh I have counted as a casual friend, a friend of a friend, called me and said I was about to be the subject of a sting, I was about to receive a phone call, there was girl in Andy Coulson's office [the then editor of the News of the World] who was going to speak to me on the phone; the phone call would be recorded; she would try to entice me into talking about intimate details about her and my life.
I was told by Rav Singh that Andy Coulson would be listening to the call and I would have to obfuscate when I had that phone call without betraying the fact I knew I was being set up so to I didn't land him [Rav Singh] in it.

The Leveson inquiry has heard powerful evidence from the parents of a schoolgirl murdered by a classmate in 1991 who claim press coverage of her death contributed to their teenage son's suicide.
Margaret Watson said articles in the Glasgow Herald and Marie Claire were ill-informed and inaccurate. "It was all too much for Alan," she said, referring to her son, who was 15 at the time of his death.
Her husband Jim said in a statement that their son had been found dead with copies of the articles in his hand.

2.27pm: Hugh Grant says there are two types of photographers - staff photographers who show "a modicum of decency" and criminal paparazzi.

The police have told me they are increasingly recruited from the criminal classes who will stop at nothing because the bounty on these photos is very high.
He says there are paps who take pictures of girls up their skirts and digitally remove their underwear.

He also told the inquiry that Church had her mobile phone targeted by the News of the World. He said the singer's mother had been approached by the paper shortly after a suicide attempt and it had negotiated a "Faustian pact" in which she agreed to tell her story in exchange for the paper not running further stories about her husband's affair.
Sherborne said Church had endured horrendous treatment from the tabloids, including photographers trying to open car doors while she was inside in order to take pictures up her skirt. News International chose not to comment.

[AQMP]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/22/leveson-inquiry-steve-coogan-marina-hyde

Marina Hyde in good form in the Guardian, especially about Elle Macpherson

[Sandino]

One thing that has stood out for me is that someone hacked into Milly Dowlers phone and removed voicemail thus leading her parents to believe that she was still alive. I can think off few things more evil than giving her parents false hope that she was alive. All for a cheap story! However as long as f**kwits buy these rags they will continue to dod this and much worse. I wonder how many stories that are in the public interest have been suppressed so that more lurid ones may be published.

[AQMP]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/22/leveson-inquiry-steve-coogan-marina-hyde

Marina Hyde in good form in the Guardian, especially about Elle Macpherson

Ooops, seems Marina may need to check her own sources:

News International QC Rhodri Davies who has just confirmed that the inquiry's barrister Carine Patry-Hoskins has not been doorstepped by the Sun and the Sun did not send anyone, contrary to reports in Marina Hyde's column this morning in the Guardian