News of the World Phone Hacking Update

As police interview a former News of the World journalist who claimed Andy Coulson asked him to hack phones, the last week has seen the pressure increase on both the newspaper and David Cameron's Director of Communications. On Thursday the 9th of September House of Commons debate was the site of a series of robust attacks on press intrusion - for example see Tom Watson MP's forthright (but on the whole characteristic) contribution below:




The claim that MPs have so far refrained from coming down on press intrusion with too much vigour for fear of becoming victims themselves is replicated elsewhere, for example in a Guardian article reporting the claim of former Plaid Cymru MP Adam Price:

Price told Channel 4 News last night that four members of the committee had considered asking the serjeant at arms to issue a warrant forcing Brooks to attend. He said: "We could have used the nuclear option. We decided not to, I think to some extent because of what I was told at the time by a senior Conservative member of the committee, who I know was in direct contact with executives at News International, that if we went for her, called her back, subpoenaed her, they would go for us. [This] meant effectively that they would delve into our personal lives in order to punish them and I think that's part of the reason we didn't do it." Watson told Channel 4 News that News International had further interfered by asking Downing Street to persuade him to tone down his questioning. "A [former Labour] cabinet minister has confirmed to me this week that News International talked to my former colleagues in No 10 Downing Street to ask them whether I would withdraw my aggressive line of questioning … I felt very frightened and intimidated." Watson added that he was told that Brooks vowed to destroy him after he led the Labour coup that persuaded Tony Blair to resign. "A very senior News International journalist told me at the Labour party conference in 2006, in the early hours of the morning, that his editor would never forgive me for resigning as a minister in Tony Blair's government and that she would pursue me for the rest of my political career until I was destroyed."

News: Metropolitan Police to Look at new Evidence in News of the World Phone Tapping Case

From BBC News: The London Metropolitan Police have confirmed that they will look at new evidence which has come to light recently in relation to the News of the World phone hacking case in which stories were obtained by hacking the phones of the Royal Family, celebrities and politicians.

This announcement follows claims in the New York Times at the weekend that the practice of phone hacking at the newspaper was far more widespread than so far recognised. Furthermore the detail that the then editor Andy Coulson apparantly knew about, condoned and even requested phone hacking is likely to continue to be a focal point to the story due to his current role as a close advisor to David Cameron and Director of Communications - the News of the World continue to maintain that only one employee is ever known to have been hacking people's phones and that he did so without the knowledge of his employers. The NYT story presents a very different picture:

But interviews with more than a dozen former reporters and editors at News of the World present a different picture of the newsroom. They described a frantic, sometimes degrading atmosphere in which some reporters openly pursued hacking or other improper tactics to satisfy demanding editors. Andy Coulson, the top editor at the time, had imposed a hypercompetitive ethos, even by tabloid standards. One former reporter called it a “do whatever it takes” mentality. The reporter was one of two people who said Coulson was present during discussions about phone hacking. Coulson ultimately resigned but denied any knowledge of hacking.

News of the World was hardly alone in accessing messages to obtain salacious gossip. “It was an industrywide thing,” said Sharon Marshall, who witnessed hacking while working at News of the World and other tabloids. “Talk to any tabloid journalist in the United Kingdom, and they can tell you each phone company’s four-digit codes. Every hack on every newspaper knew this was done.”

Journalists' Sources

A journalist, Suzanne Breen, has been taken to court by the Police Service of Northern Ireland who want her to turn over all records of her interactions with Real IRA sources. The judge in the case has said he may order her to hand this material over, depending on how Breen's legal team respond.

Although there are specific reasons for thinking that Breen ought to have the right to keep her sources secret on this occasion - i.e. her own security - I'm interested in the general principle of journalists being allowed to keep their sources secret. What is this institution for? Is it a net benefit? I take it that the argument in favour runs that it is better for more information about terrorists to reach the public domain, and if journalists couldn't conceal their sources they would be severely restricted in how they cover these sorts of stories. Wheras the benefit of police access to journalists' information would be short term only - terrorists just wouldn't talk to journalists.

I'm inclined to think that the principle is a good one, and the only reason I can see for not actually having the principle encoded in law is that this could be exploited by people using it as a cover for involvement in terrorism and serious criminality.

Also, the fact that police are going through the courts may contradict a piece in the Guardian I blogged about a few weeks ago suggesting that journalists would soon be unable to keep sources secret because of the insecurity of digital communications.

Can Whistleblowing Survive?

An interesting piece from last weeks Guardian media supplement. New detection technologies will make it increasingly difficult for investigative journalists to make use of whistleblowers without the employers knowing.

Is this just a price which comes with the new technological innovations, or are there any viable solutions, whether legal or technological?