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March 16, 2013 11:30 AM

Rupert Murdoch Hit With 600 New Hacking Claims

By Diane Sweet

rupert-murdoch

New phone-hacking allegations at Rupert Murdoch's now closed newspaper News of the World have been made.

Sources told The Guardian on Friday that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. has been hit with 600 new hacking claims, some new victims, and some people who had earlier decided not to sue. Scotland Yard’s new information reportedly comes from a former suspect turned informant for the police. The news comes just days before Britain’s high court will hear arguments from more than a dozen people—including Cherie Blair and David Beckham’s father—who settled last fall with News International, News Corp.’s British wing. With the new claims, the investigation into hacking at News Corp. could last well into 2015:

Further details are expected to emerge on Monday morning at the high court during a hearing relating to the existing litigation by hacking victims against Murdoch's News International (NI) – hours before MPs are due to vote on joint Labour and Liberal Democrat amendments that would introduce a backstop law to stiffen regulation of the press.

Sources say Scotland Yard detectives believe they can identify as many as 600 new incidents after obtaining the phone records of an insider who is now being lined up as a crown witness. As a result of the new information, the force's Operation Weeting is revisitng the timetable for concluding its investigation, which had been due to be completed with the conclusion of trials this year. Police now expect their work to continue into 2015.

The 600 new potential litigants fall into three groups: new victims; others who sued over hacking but signed agreements with NI allowing them to sue the company again; and a third group who signed agreements potentially barring them from suing again. The indications are that there may be "some hundreds of new legal actions" from the first two groups.

On Monday the high court will hear formally of at least a dozen settlements out of the 167 civil claims filed last autumn from individuals including Cherie Blair and David Beckham's father, Ted. Blair was one of 170 victims who chose to sue in the high court instead of going through the NI private scheme, which has so far accepted 254 compensation claims.

And here I thought there wasn't a phone left that Murdock's goons hadn't hacked yet...

Tags: informant, investigation, News of the World, phone-hacking, Rupert Murdoch, Scotland Yard

February 17, 2012 11:39 AM

How the 1% Exploits America: Rupert Murdoch, News Corp

By Diane Sweet

Another in a series of 1-minute films that reveal the methods of the worst of the 1% who are using their wealth to exploit the 99%

From Brave New Films and Occupy the Boardroom.

Tags: 1 percent, 99 percent, Fox News, Media, news corp, News of the World, Rupert Murdoch

December 10, 2012 06:29 PM

Senator Sanders: Media Must be Relevant to 'Ordinary People'

By Diane Sweet

In 1983, 50 corporations controlled a majority of American media. Now that number is six. And Big Media may get even bigger, thanks to the FCC’s consideration of ending a rule preventing companies from owning a newspaper and radio and TV stations in the same big city. Such a move — which they’ve tried in 2003 and 2007 as well –would give these massive media companies free rein to devour more of the competition, control the public message, and also limit diversity across the media landscape. On this week’s Moyers & Company (check local listings), Senator Bernie Sanders, one of several Senators who have written FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski asking him to suspend the plan, joins Bill to discuss why Big Media is a threat to democracy and what citizens can do to fight back.

Sanders also expresses his dismay that such a move would come from an Obama appointee. “Why the Obama Administration is doing something that the Bush Administration failed to do is beyond my understanding,” Sanders tells Bill. “And we’re gonna do everything we can to prevent it from happening.”

Sanders explains why even "ordinary people" should be concerned the media and increased concentration of ownership in the media: "Bill, many of the viewers there are concerned about the growing gap, unequal distribution of wealth and income. They're concerned about health care, concerned about global warming, concerned about women's rights, health, and many, many other issues."

"If you are concerned about those issues, you must be concerned about media and the increased concentration of ownership in the media. Because unless we get ordinary people involved in that discussion. Unless we make media relevant to the lives of ordinary people and not use it as a distraction, we are not going to resolve many of these serious crisis, global warming being one. There are scientists who will come on your show and say, "Hey, forget everything else. If we don't get a handle on global warming, there's not going to be much left of this planet in a hundred years." Do you see that often being portrayed in the corporate media? I fear not."

Full transcript after the jump.

Continue reading »

Tags: Barack Obama, Bernie Sanders, Big Media, Bill Moyers, chicago tribune, FCC, FCC media consolidation, Fox News, Julius Genachowski, LA Times, media monopoly, mediamonopoly, PBS, Rupert Murdoch, widget

January 23, 2013 05:02 PM

Who's the Terrorist?

By Diane Sweet

notterrorists

On Monday, December 31st, Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post reported that weapons and high explosive powder were found in the home of a Greenwich Village couple. New York Post reporter Jamie Schram claimed that the accused is an "Occupy Wall Street activist", sans a single source (not even an anonymous one) for the OWS connection.

And so as the OWS PR working group was forced to call the press to account: "We urge members of the media to refrain from spreading rumors and misinformation," emphasizing in the immediate aftermath of the story that "There is nothing… to support a link between OWS and the individual arrested."

Soon after, this was confirmed by the NYPD in the New York Times, which acknowledged there was no evidence the accused was active in any political movements whatsoever. Within another day, Schram himself was forced to write an update which struck any mention of Occupy from the record. The Village Voice documented the lies in New York Post Helps NYPD Slander Occupy Wall Street (Again), followed by FAIR's account of the phony link between Occupy and the arrests, and another Voice headline: More Misresporting on the West Village Explosive Arrests.

This is far from the first time that the Post has distorted the facts of a story in order to associate the movement with violence. As Your Inbox: Occupied, has noted, the results of media misinformation have contributed to "the marginalization of constituencies and views that deserve respectful treatment by reporters, documented police violence, and unconstitutional domestic spying activities."

As Nick Pinto of the Village Voice notes, "a full two days after the Occupy link had already been debunked, CBS This Morning ran a segment doubling down on the false claim," going so far as to bring on Mitchell Silber of K2 Intelligence, a corporate investigation firm. "It's unclear why CBS doesn't bother to identify him as such," writes Pinto, "but well into 2012, Silber was the Director of the Analytic and Cyber Units in the NYPD's controversial Intelligence Division, where he was associated with the division's program of widespread surveillance of Muslim Americans."

Multiple times this year it has become clear that the effort to cast aspersions of criminality over this movement for equity and democracy portends an escalation in repression. When we first called attention to the National Defense Authorization Act, we were seeing frightening signs that violent elements acting outside of Occupy Wall Street and against our principles, will be marshaled to justify a future crackdown heralding from the inner sanctum of the Executive. And the scope of this problem has recently become even more pronounced through disclosures that the "FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity. These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America." This pathetic, yet extremely damaging example of collusion between Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street tabloid and elements within the FBI, proves the point.

If you need ideas to start moving from behind your screens and into the streets, we recommend that you start at the nonviolent database of direct action from Swarthmore College.

[Via OccupyWallSt.org, OccupyWallStreet.net]

Tags: #OWS, NDAA, NYPD, Occupy Wall Street, Rupert Murdoch, street.net

January 03, 2013 06:50 PM

Protect OWS from False Allegations of Terrorism

By Diane Sweet

occupyws

On Monday, December 31st, Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post reported that weapons and high explosive powder were found in the home of a Greenwich Village couple. The article also featured an evidence-free assertion that one of the accused is an “Occupy Wall Street activist”.

Take Action Now to Protect OWS from false allegations of terrorism

As the OWS PR working group emphasized in the immediate aftermath of the story, “There is nothing… to support a link between OWS and the individual arrested."

The NYPD further does not believe that that the accused was active in any political movements, as reported in the New York Times. And when the New York Post reporter, Jamie Schram, was asked by Atiq Zabinski of the OWS Media Working Group to cite his source for the OWS connection, he refused, and abruptly ended the conversation, referring Zabinski to the Post’s legal department.

Occupiers have long been experiencing the tangible impact of hyping falsehoods about Occupy Wall Street, such as how it contributes to real and documented police violence, unconstitutional domestic spying activities, and the marginalization of constituencies and views that deserve respectful treatment by reporters.

The scope of this problem has recently become even more pronounced through the “disclosures that FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity. These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.”

In response the ‘Your Inbox: Occupied’ team decided to start a petition for concerned OWS activists demanding a retraction and an apology from the New York Post on the same print and Web pages as the original accusation.

Since its inception Occupy Wall Street has been firmly committed to non-violence. Yet this is far from the first time that the Post has distorted the facts of a story in order to associate the movement with violence.

Sign the petition today, and then we can go deliver them in person to Rupert Murdoch.

[Via some of the good folks within the Occupy movement]

Tags: #OWS, Activists, apology, distorted facts, false allegations, new york post, Occupy Wall Street, retraction, Rupert Murdoch, Terrorism

January 17, 2013 02:33 PM

Occupy Wall Street Delivers Petition to the New York Post

By Diane Sweet



Video streaming by Ustream

Occupy Wall Street delivered a petition to Rupert Murdoch's New York Post demanding a retraction and apology for falsely linking OWS with terrorism. (For background story, see my previous report here.)

Tags: Lies, new york post, Occupy Wall Street, Rupert Murdoch, slander

January 04, 2013 09:44 PM

More Misreporting On the West Village Explosives Arrests

By Diane Sweet

aarongreene

In a previous report about the couple accused of manufacturing explosives in their West Village apartment, I referred to Aaron Greene as "Harvard educated" based on earlier reports. The original report was by five New York Post reporters, and that information was also cited by the Associated Press, Reuters, and other outlets carrying the story.

But reached by telephone today, a spokeswoman from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government tells the Gothamist, "Aaron Greene did not attend Harvard Kennedy School, or Harvard undergrad."

The Harvard citation is the second detail from that New York Post report that has proven false, the first being the couple's connection to Occupy Wall Street. That detail was disproved in comments made by NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne to the New York Times. Kelly McBride, a senior ethics faculty member at the Poynter Institute, told The Village Voice:

"In a case like this, the best practices would suggest that The Post is definitely obligated to correct their mistake, both by updating the online version of the story and noting the error, as well as printing a correction in the paper to inform people who saw the mistake there."

It has also been reported that Aaron Greene previously stabbed a bouncer in 2005 with an eleven-inch butcher knife and served eight months in jail. The man he stabbed says that the altercation began after Greene stole his slice of pizza and stalked him through the Lower East Side—and soon after the stabbing he predicted Greene was more dangerous than authorities believed at the time. "I told the District Attorney that one of these days, he's gonna shoot up a schoolyard or blow up a federal building," the bouncer says. "But watch—he's gonna skate on these new charges, he's gonna get off because of his family."

Add "new parents" to the list of things the hippie couple has been called in the last few days. After being arrested on suspicion of terrorism when seven grams of highly explosive HMTD were found in their Greenwich Village apartment over the weekend, New York native Morgan Gliedman's arraignment was postponed on Monday so she could give birth to baby daughter Melody.

Tags: aaron greene, baby, explosives, misreporting, Morgan Gliedman, new york post, Rupert Murdoch, west village