With the announcement that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation has dropped its bid for full ownership of satellite broadcaster BSkyB, the media mogul’s once-sturdy corporate house appears to be collapsing around his head. The revelations that for years the News of the World tabloid grossly violated the privacy rights not only of royalty and celebrities but also of murder victims and troops killed in combat has now provoked a fierce public outcry against the paper and News Corporation’s other outlets—but will it be enough to topple Murdoch’s massive media empire?
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From the beginning of the 2000s, private detectives contracted by the News of the World illegally hacked into the phone accounts of celebrities such as Gwyneth Paltrow, Hugh Grant and Sienna Miller.
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The paper also managed to eavesdrop on the phone messages of Princes William and Charles, and even used bribes to dig up personal information about Queen Elizabeth.
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But it was the case of 13-year-old murder victim Milly Dowler that ignited the current brushfire of outrage against Murdoch’s paper. When Dowler went missing in March of 2002, News of the World journalists hacked into her phone to listen to messages from frantic friends and family members. They even deleted messages to make room for new ones, giving false hope that Dowler was still alive and interfering with the investigation into her disappearance.
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After the Dowler revelation, more victims quickly emerged: the paper’s reporters had also gained access to the voicemails of British soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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And they had listened in on the voicemails of victims of the July 7, 2005, London bombing.
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In a last-ditch effort to save the family reputation, Rupert Murdoch’s son James shut down News of the World last week. But that hasn’t silenced the chorus of outraged politicians: Prime Minister David Cameron condemned the hacking as “dreadful,” and Labour Party leader Ed Miliband called for Rebekah Brooks to resign.
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Brooks, who was editor of News of the World when journalists hacked Milly Dowler’s phone and who was until this week chief executive of Murdoch’s News International, claims it is “inconceivable” that she knew about her reporters’ illegal practices.
Nevertheless, she stepped down from her post on July 15, saying in a statement to her staff that her resignation “makes it possible for me to have the freedom and the time to give my full co-operation to all the current and future inquiries, the police investigations and the [Parliamentary Culture, Media and Sport Committee] appearance.”
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But the fallout didn’t end with Brooks, and on July 15 Dow Jones CEO and Wall Street Journal publisher Les Hinton followed her out the door when he abruptly resigned from both positions.
In his letter to Murdoch, Hinton explained, “I have seen hundreds of news reports of both actual and alleged misconduct during the time I was executive chairman of News International and responsible for the company. The pain caused to innocent people is unimaginable. That I was ignorant of what apparently happened is irrelevant and in the circumstances I feel it is proper for me to resign from News Corp. and apologize to those hurt by the actions of News of the World.”
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Andy Coulson, who edited News of the World after Brooks’s departure in 2003, was dogged by accusations that he also knew about his journalists’ hacking practices, accusations he has denied.
Yet despite his rocky tenure at the paper, Coulson was appointed Prime Minister David Cameron’s Director of Communications last year—and then resigned this January amid the growing scandal.
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The pressure from politicians and the public caused Murdoch’s News Corporation to announce this morning that it was withdrawing its bid to take over BSkyB, the largest satellite broadcasting company in the UK. But News Corporation already owns a significant share of BSkyB, and also controls television stations and newspapers all over the world.
Murdoch’s global empire of media holdings has expanded over the years to now include US companies like Fox News, the New York Post and the Wall Street Journal. All of which prompts the question, Could an invasion of privacy scandal like News of the World’s happen here in the US?
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With News Corporation’s share values in free-fall, is Murdoch’s hold on his global media holdings starting to slip? And more importantly, will American politicians have the courage to stand up to Murdoch’s monopolistic business practices as British politicians are just now starting to do?
For regular updates from the continuing fallout from the News of the World scandal, check out Greg Mitchell’s Murdoch Watch blog. And for more background on News Corporation, read pieces from over three decades of Nation coverage of Murdoch.
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