Here’s the problem – it’s not clear whether phones of 9/11 victims were actually hacked.
The original Daily Mirror story says:
The pair chatted behind closed doors as a former New York cop made the 9/11 hacking claim. He alleged he was contacted by News of the World journalists who said they would pay him to retrieve the private phone records of the dead.
Now working as a private investigator, the ex-officer claimed reporters wanted the victim’s phone numbers and details of the calls they had made and received in the days leading up to the atrocity.
A source said: “This investigator is used by a lot of journalists in America and he recently told me that he was asked to hack into the 9/11 victims’ private phone data. He said that the journalists asked him to access records showing the calls that had been made to and from the mobile phones belonging to the victims and their relatives.
“His presumption was that they wanted the information so they could hack into the relevant voicemails, just like it has been shown they have done in the UK. The PI said he had to turn the job down. He knew how insensitive such research would be, and how bad it would look.
Because of the wording, it is equally likely that 9/11 victims may not have been hacked. That is now for the FBI to determine.
Notably though, the Daily Mirror report does not find specific evidence but reports someone was asked to do so and turned it down. It’s not a watertight case in other words.
The bigger worry for Murdoch – I think – is that the SEC opens an investigation into whether News Corporation indulged in corruption and bribery.
That is what several Democratic Senators have also called for and I think that line of inquiry would have more legs.
http://liberalconspiracy.org/2011/07/15/how-badly-will-the-fbi-investigation-hurt-murdoch/