scandal-stained wretches

News Corp. ‘Smoking Phone’ Found in Hacking Inquiry

When former News of the World editor Andy Coulson said last year, “I don’t accept there was a culture of phone hacking at the NOTW,” echoing years of denials from across News Corp., he must have forgotten about the existence of one shared newsroom cell phone, nicknamed “the hub,” which was seemingly used in more than 1,000 phone hacks. The Independent reports today that investigators in the hacking inquiry located one device, which call logs indicate illegally accessed 1,150 numbers between 2004 and 2006, indicating that the shady tactics were carried out within News International’s London headquarters.

Although it’s unclear who exactly controlled the device, one former journalist at the tabloid says it was used by a small group of individuals, who then doled out information. Reporters would be told “precisely where a person would be at a given time, so we could go and intercept, photograph and question them. That person would be surprised at how we had discovered their whereabouts. In retrospect the obvious explanation is that a voicemail was left somewhere in which the person had declared their intention to be at a specific location at a specific time.”

Met finds secret phone at centre of NI hacking [Independent]

News Corp. ‘Smoking Phone’ Found in Hacking Inquiry