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UK Law Enforcement Demanding Guardian's Sources On News Of The World Hacking Scandal [Updated]

from the journalist-shields? dept

Wed, Sep 21st 2011 3:44pm — Mike Masnick

There's been a growing attack on the right of journalists to keep their sources secret. In the US, we've seen attempts to expose newspaper sources using the Espionage Act, and it appears that over in the UK something similar is happening. Scotland Yard is apparently demanding that The Guardian reveal its sources for its thorough and widespread reporting on the News of the World phone hacking scandal. This would be the same UK law enforcement folks who were alerted to the phone hacking and chose to ignore it... while The Guardian pushed on doing the reporting to expose it. To then pressure The Guardian to give up its sources certainly has the feeling of attacking the guys who exposed Scotland Yard's failures in investigating News of the World earlier... Update: Looks like the press attention to this story has caused Scotland Yard to back down. Still, it seems like this could create serious chilling effects for UK press.

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Filed Under: journalism, news of the world, protection, rupert murdoch, scotland yard, shield
Companies: news corp.

12 Comments

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The eejit (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 3:15pm

Correction, that's been dropped (possibly to prevent repercussions from coming back onto lots of people in power right now.)
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- A Dan (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 3:55pm
  
  Re:
  Agreed. A little too late to the party, Mike.
  http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/sep/20/metropolitan-police-drop-hacking-sources-action
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  - Richard (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 3:57pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Yes - although the Guardian editor said on the radio this morning that the police have only dropped the official secrets act approach - they are still trying to find the source by other means.
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    - That Anonymous Coward (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 5:13pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      I hear some ex-employees of News of the World have some skills at hacking into peoples voicemails to get information. Maybe they should speak with them?
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  - Chosen Reject (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 4:09pm
    
    Re: Re:
    So what if they dropped the case. That they brought the case at all is news.
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Sam (profile), 21 Sep 2011 @ 3:56pm

MPs are also holding an inquiry into why exactly the attempt was made in the first place... though the inquiry is being held in secret.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Sep 2011 @ 4:40pm

As many have already pointed out, the inquiry was dropped due to a shitstorm of bad PR. It appears that the outcry was so loud that even some MPs heard, way up in their ivory tower made of false expense claims. The senior Met official who decided to drop the inquiry has been called before the Commons Home Affairs Committee to explain himself. They're not questioning his decision to pursue a freedom of the press destroying investigation. Rather, they want him to explain what further steps have been taken by the Met to prevent leaks by their officers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15006572
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abc gum, 21 Sep 2011 @ 5:54pm

The investigation will continue with a more covert approach because the rich elite ruling class can not tolerate such insolence from the peons.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Sep 2011 @ 7:47pm

The U.K. Should join China, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan on their internet-code-of-conduct proposal at the U.N. LoL

http://blog.internetgovernance.org/pdf/UN-infosec-code.pdf
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PaulT (profile), 22 Sep 2011 @ 1:48am

Glad to see they've backed down. The Guardian seems to be one of the few newspapers left in the world that's actually interested in investigative journalism and retain some morals. It would be a shame if they were forced to violate trust and possibly put off people coming forward to expose future scandals.
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- Hephaestus (profile), 22 Sep 2011 @ 8:24am
  
  Re:
  "The Guardian seems to be one of the few newspapers left in the world that's actually interested in investigative journalism"
  
  That does tend to piss off politicians.
  
  Getting to the truth and not just quoting press releases. How dare they!! don't they know their place?
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Bashir, 9 Jan 2012 @ 7:51am

tolerate
The investigation will continue with a more covert approach because the rich elite ruling class can not tolerate such insolence from the peons
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