The Rupert Murdoch News of the World Hacking/Bugging scandal just blew up big time.
Breaking from the LA Times:
Reporting from London— Lawmakers, advertisers and outraged citizens turned up the heat on British tabloid News of the World as more accusations surfaced Wednesday of possible hacking attempts by the paper into cellphones belonging to the relatives of victims of criminal and terrorist attacks.
Prime Minister David Cameron backed calls for public inquiries into the reporting practices and ethics of journalists at the News of the World and into why a previous police investigation failed to uncover the allegations now emerging. But those inquiries would have to wait until the current police investigation is completed, Cameron said.
The British leader expressed revulsion at the possibility that a private investigator hired by the tabloid had targeted the phones of family members of three murdered English schoolgirls and victims of the 2005 suicide attacks on the London transport system, which killed 52 people six years ago Thursday.
full article here:
http://www.latimes.com/...
Murdoch, as well as the editor of the tabloid are denying knowledge of the bugging, but that will surely be investigated.
The latest news was apparently a big enough deal in the UK that their Parliament held an emergency session to discuss the fallout. Prime Minister David Cameron was present at the 3-hour meeting and said this:
"We are no longer talking here about politicians and celebrities. We are talking about murder victims, potentially terrorist victims, having their phones hacked into. It is absolutely disgusting,"
Cameron is under particlular pressure to investigate, since he only recently hired a former Murdoch editor, Andy Coulson, as his communications chief. Coulson resigned in January, in the wake of this scandal.
In a related story, Murdoch is currently trying to acquire a big satellite broadcaster BSkyB in the UK. Many Britons are rightly concerned that his control of this company would give NewsCorp too much power over British media. Hopefully this latest revelation will derail his efforts to own said company.
Video of the emergency Parliament meeting (h/t New York Times):
UPDATE 1:
From the comments, citizenx adds this bit of sweet news:
Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. shares dropped Wednesday as investigations continue into one of its British newspapers alleged hacking into the voicemail belonging to a murdered teenager.
News Corp. shares dropped about 4 percent during afternoon trading, but the overall stock market picked up, CNNMoney reported.
UPDATE 2:
More gold from the comments, this time from AnnetteK and voroki:
I can tell you that the public here in Britain are in full meltdown mode about this.
Quite rightly and at long last IMHO.
Murdoch may finally be meeting his much delayed Karma.
I'm really hoping for a scandal of Watergate proportions for ol' Rupe.
Ha, ha, ha. Protesters with Rupert Murdoch masks manipulating a puppet david cameron outside of parliament today. (voroki)
BONUS UPDATE 2.5:
AP photo of voroki's comment:
Oy!, right now there is a dead serviceman's mother in tears on the BBC, she has learned that relatives phones may have been hacked after servicemen were killed in action.Tons of big companies are now pulling advertising, don't want to be associated with Murdoch.
UPDATE 3:
The Daily Telegraph is reporting that the Murdoch Paper was also hacking relatives of servicemembers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
UPDATE 4:
Keith Olbermann covered the story on tonight's Countdown (h/t Diogenes2008):
UPDATE 5:
Breaking from The Sydney Morning Herald:
Journalists and executives from the News of the World are expected to be arrested within days as the phone-hacking scandal widens to include the families of dead soliders among the newspaper's targets.
Five journalists would be among those hauled in by police, according to a report in The Times, a News International stablemate of the beleagured tabloid.
The journalists would be questioned as News International's own investigation was said to be close to discovering who had authorised the hacking of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler's phone.
article:
http://www.smh.com.au/...