BREAKING: UK parliamentary report finds Murdoch "unfit" to run a global company

This is happening now.  Live feed of the committee.  More to come. "Rupert Murdoch is not fit to run a multinational company."

BBC:

Rupert Murdoch "is not a fit person to exercise the stewardship of a major international company", MPs have said. The cross-party culture committee questioned journalists and bosses at the now closed paper, as well as police and lawyers for hacking victims. It concluded that Mr Murdoch exhibited "wilful blindness" to what was going on in his media empire. And it said the News of the World and News International misled Parliament about the scale of phone hacking.

Why is the American press not looking into whether Fox and the WSJ were involved in this scandal as well? Three other Murdoch properties were. Reason enough to inquire whether the same thing happened at other Murdoch companies.

Murdoch blames everyone else for hacking problem

Now here's some classic leadership skills for you by Rupert Murdoch. Either he's a completely clueless executive and should be sacked immediately for having no idea what has been happening within his organization for years or he's a liar. You choose.

It's gutless to blame everyone else and fail to accept responsibility as the CEO but this is Murdoch that we're talking about. How could it be possible to have so many hacking scandals within the News Corp organizations - allegedly across borders as well - yet he knew nothing about it? How weak to suddenly be the tough guy.

With wife Wendi and son Lachlan watching he said that he, his son James and other senior News Corp executives were “misinformed and shielded” about the extent of phone hacking at the tabloid. He also blamed “a clever lawyer” at News International for stopping people coming forward and admitted that the culture had left too much in the hands of the editor and lawyer. “I should have gone there and thrown all the lawyers out of the place and seen Mr Goodman (the reporter jailed over phone hacking) one-on-one - he had been an employee for a long time - and cross-examined him myself and made up my mind, maybe rightly, maybe wrongly, was he telling the truth,” Murdoch told the court. "And if I had come to the conclusion that he was telling the truth, I would have torn the place apart and we wouldn't be here today.

Case for legal action against Murdoch in USA building, over 1,000 phones likely hacked in UK

Although this latest report from The Guardian doesn't specifically say Fox News was involved in hacking, it does throw Fox News into the scandal by suggesting there are reports of something that involving a breach of privacy. It's unfortunate that too many Democrats play the Fox News game of pretending as though they are fair and balanced, though perhaps it is out of fear. Whatever it is, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp media empire may have some problems in the US in the very near future.

Lewis said that he had been contacted by a number of people since he arrived in the US last weekend "raising issues against other [News Corp] titles or Fox News, not necessarily about hacking but about other untoward dark arts to obtain information that should be private." He added that the new complaints were unproven allegations.

Lewis told reporters that he had taken on a fourth case of alleged phone hacking in the US. Previously, it had been known that he was representing three individuals, one of whom is an American citizen and two of whom are Europeans who believe their phones were hacked while visiting America.

In addition, Siegel, a former head of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said he had been contacted by six individuals raising complaints about News Corp outlets. "My experience in these sorts of cases is that when people sense you are serious and balanced in your approach, they begin to come out of the woodwork," he said.

And Bloomberg reports that in the UK over 1,000 cell phones were likely hacked by News of the World.

Lawsuits against Murdoch's News Corp coming to America

American authorities are too afraid of Murdoch to take action but fortunately at least one UK lawyer is traveling to the US to investigate the process of suing News Corp. The payouts for hacking have been high in the UK but the numbers will take an immediate jump if they're successful in the US. It also stands to reason that once one lawyer has success with a case, many more will be looking for reasons to sue News Corp. This year could be an exciting year for Rupert Murdoch's empire. The Guardian:

Mark Lewis, the lawyer who has been at the forefront of efforts to expose the News of the World phone-hacking scandal, is poised to bring the battle for legal redress across the Atlantic and to the doorstep of Rupert Murdoch's media empire.

Lewis will arrive in the US on Saturday and next week will begin legal discussions in New York, just a stone's throw away from News Corporation's global headquarters on Sixth Avenue. His arrival constitutes a major escalation in the legal ramifications of the hacking scandal for Murdoch, who has tried desperately to keep it away from the American core of his multi-billion-dollar media holdings.

Details remain sketchy about precisely what Lewis intends to do in the US, but the Guardian has learned that he will be having legal discussions that could lead to several lawsuits being lodged with the New York courts. The direct involvement of the US judicial system in allegations of illegal activity by News Corp employees would bring the scandal dramatically closer to Murdoch's adopted home.

Murdoch's Times of London in the news for hacking

The Murdoch media empire really struggles with following the law. Whether it's hiring Special Ops or private hackers to spy on the competition or promoting a "culture of illegal payments" this sounds like a rogue organization. Their latest problem is hacking a police blogger. As in a police officer who blogged.

Rupert Murdoch's Times of London is facing a claim for exemplary damages after admitting hacking into the email of an anonymous police blogger to expose his identity, lawyer Mark Lewis told Reuters on Friday.

Lewis, of law firm Taylor Hampton and representing police detective Richard Horton, said Horton had filed for misuse of confidential information, breach of confidence and deceit at London's High Court this week.

The Times exposed Horton as the author of the blog, in which he wrote about police work under the name NightJack, in 2009. Horton had sought an injunction to protect his anonymity but lost his case.

What will be the next scandal at News Corp?

Murdoch's Sky News admits hacking emails for stories - how is this different than Wikileaks and Assange?

It's different because Assange and Wikileaks have a heck of a stronger moral high ground to stand on than Murdoch media.  More on that in a moment.

Obviously we're well past the point where anyone can say the hacking was an isolated incident on just one part of the Murdoch media empire. The excuse being offered by cable news channel Sky News is that they stand by their crimes because they were in the best interest of the public.

"We stand by these actions as editorially justified and in the public interest," the head of Sky News, John Ryley, said in a statement.

Now that's contrition.

Maybe evidence acquired illegally in the UK will hold up in court, but that presents some serious problems in the US.  Not to mention the ethics, and overall creepiness, of it.

It's interesting that the Murdoch media network has been so hard on Julian Assange and Wikileaks yet surprise, surprise, they have a great excuse for themselves. After all, what's more important: someone lying about a death to get the insurance money (the Murdoch paper's excuse) or an administration's lies about the justification for war (Wikileak's excuse)?

Huh? What's that answer, Rupert? Speak a little louder so we can all appreciate the full difference.

CNN:

UK news channel Sky News said Thursday it had authorized its journalists to hack into the e-mail of individual members of the public on two occasions.

John Ryley, head of Sky News, said the instances involved suspected criminal activity.

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

Now that Sky has admitted to breaking the law, when will Scotland Yard arrest someone?

NOTE FROM JOHN: Now that we know that the culture of corruption permeated a number of Murdoch's media ventures, it's fair to ask whether Murdoch's other media ventures, including FOX News and the Wall Street Journal, bit from the same fruit of the poisonous tree.  And the nerve of Sky News to puff up its chest and suggest that illegal domestic spying by a newspaper is "editorially justified."  Really, is that how it works now?  We no longer go to the authorities in order to hack into someone's email, we simply ask our editor.

And why is this man John Ryley still the head of Sky News, and not sitting in jail somewhere? Do Fox News and the WSJ agree with Murdoch's man Ryley that it's okay to hack someone's email if it's "editorially justified" and in the public interest?  I'm sure some would argue that it's editorially justified and in the public interest - especially after all of this - to know what's in the email files of Murdoch and his senior staff at Fox and the WSJ, if only to know how far this conspiracy goes.  Does that make it right?

Rupert Murdoch's son leaves BSkyB after new hacking allegations

Last week the BBC broadcast what may turn out to be the biggest Murdoch scandal of them all.

NDS [a News Corp subsidiary] is accused of leaking information from On Digital which could be used to create counterfeit smart cards, giving people free access to paid for TV.

The latest claims have been made by Lee Gibling - who set up a website in the late 90s known as The House of Ill-Compute, or Thoic.

Mr Gibling told the BBC he was paid to publish stolen information. His contact at NDS was Ray Adams, who at the time was head of UK security for the firm - which manufactures smartcards for all News Corporations' pay-TV companies across the world.

Today James Murdoch, Rupert's son, has stepped down as chairman of BSkyB.

The NDS/Sky rumors have been circulating in the cryptography world for quite a while but without sources. The BBC program (region locked to UK unfortunately) puts faces to the statements. What the BBC is alleging amounts to a multi-billion dollar fraud that may have bankrupted ITV On-Digital, a pay-per-view system that threatened to compete with Murdoch's own pay-per-view system BSkyB.

The BBC team claim that the man behind 'The House Of Ill Compute' site (THOIC) was paid to distribute  instructions for hacking the ITV On-Digital system.  In other words, the allegation is that they tried to kill the competition by showing people how to get it for free.

Who could have imagined that News Corporation's business practices might be as dishonest and corrupt as the 'news' they publish?

Report: Murdoch's News Corp hired hackers to fight competition

Just another happy day at News Corp. While this latest report is once again related to the UK operations, who honestly believes these alleged practices were strictly limited to the UK? The Guardian:

Part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation empire employed computer hacking to undermine the business of its chief TV rival in Britain, according to evidence due to be broadcast by BBC1's Panorama programme on Monday .

The allegations stem from apparently incriminating emails the programme-makers have obtained, and on-screen descriptions for the first time from two of the people said to be involved, a German hacker and the operator of a pirate website secretly controlled by a Murdoch company.

The witnesses allege a software company NDS, owned by News Corp, cracked the smart card codes of rival company ONdigital. ONdigital, owned by the ITV companies Granada and Carlton, eventually went under amid a welter of counterfeiting by pirates, leaving the immensely lucrative pay-TV field clear for Sky.

UK Police accuse Murdoch paper of 'jeopardizing' murder enquiry

Via Huff Post

The News of the World "jeopardised" a police inquiry into a spate of murders in Ipswich, a former senior police officer has alleged.

David Harrison, who worked on the inquiry into the killing of five prostitutes in Ipswich while at for the Serious Organised Crime Agency, told the Leveson inquiry into press ethics that the tabloid had hired ex-special forces soldiers to carry out their own surveillance on a suspect, which could have "seriously hindered" the police inquiry.

"I believe that by its actions NotW jeopardised the murder inquiry," the retired officer said in a witness statement.

Rupert Murdoch is a bully who made a fortune manufacturing outrage with lies. Now that outrage is turned in his direction he claims not to have known the methods used by his minions.

Murdoch's paper hired Special Ops team to monitor UK police

How creepy is this? It's still amazing to think that Rupert Murdoch and his media empire in the US is not tarnished by this ongoing investigation. Does anyone really believe this is not a rogue media organization that will do anything to stir up a story and smear anyone who gets in their way? Using alleged former Special Ops teams to monitor the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) doesn't sound right any way you try to spin it. For a team that likes to view themselves as supporters of law and order, they sure don't struggle with staying within the boundaries of the law. The Telegraph:

Mr Harrison said that, on at least two occasions, a vehicle parked up on a roundabout on the outskirts of the town attempted to follow the Soca surveillance team. "We identified them because they were sat in the position that we would sit in if we were doing the same job," he said. "We were told that they were probably ex-Special Forces soldiers who would have a good knowledge of surveillance techniques."