Sky News admits hacking emails

www.guardian.co.uk...

Broadcaster says accessing of emails of John Darwin, who faked own death, was authorised by executives and in public interest

Sky News has admitted that one of its senior executives authorised a journalist to conduct email hacking on two separate occasions that it said were "in the public interest" – even though intercepting emails is a prima facie breach of the Computer Misuse Act, to which there is no such defence written in law.

Rupert Murdoch's skynews has just admitted hacking email accounts.

Sky News said this was not obtained by phone hacking and a spokesman said: "All of the material obtained by Sky News was via the Darwins' computer-based email accounts

Intercepting emails is an offence under the Computer Misuse Act, and there is no public interest defence written in law. Theoretically, however, any email hacking charges would have to be brought at the discretion of the police and the Crown Prosecution Service, which could weigh up whether any intrusions could be justified.

Sky news seem a little upset at the above story so they were stupid enough to reply to it;
blogs.news.sky.com...:12494136-c08d-4d20-9dbc-8fd5b2d07259

they are discussing 'double standards and then go on to state that ;

Sky News and the BBC are in agreement on this subject. Its director general, Mark Thompson, has argued publicly that there are occasions when it is acceptable to break the law in pursuit of a story in the public interest.

From this one can only conclude that hacking is perfectly fine as long as it is in the publics interest.

It looks like Wikileaks and Anonymous just got a major seal of approval?

Double standards, is it not.

Wither or not the hacking off these emails lead to someone being convicted of fraud. The fact remains they broke the law.

If Sky News is not brought to bear, over they illegal act. Then others who hack in the name off public interest should be allowed to get away with it also.

It just shows a complete biased when it comes to channels such as Sky news.

Lets hope they do not get away with what they have done.

I saw this on the news yesterday, with an exec from Sky defending the hacking and making the point that the information they got helped in the prosecution of the guy.

However, as a "news" corporation, that is not their job and as such they broke the law. I am quite sure too that this was not the one and only time they used these methods, but just one very small example.

reply to post by Britguy


Another reason why Murdoch and co should not have full control over Sky what so ever.

Their dirty finger prints are all over this.

reply to post by AnonymousFem

Maybe that's why another (the third?) of the Murdoch's resigned recently. I forget the name but I did see it go by on the online news sites. He "stepped down" from his executive position at whatever corporation he was working at, possibly Sky. They are a bunch of [SNIP]s.

reply to post by LightSpeedDriver


I think you are referring to James Murdoch. It will not bother him either way. He still controls Sky Italia.

Still he has yet to face the inquiry, which is going on into the hacking scandals. Lets hope he get a grilling from Levenson.