Friday Essay: New Revelations of the Murdoch Empire's Underbelly

This is a humble day, declared Rupert Murdoch to a parliamentary committee on July 19, 2011. This was at the height of what the newspaper historian Roy Greenslade called “the most astonishing 14 days in British press history, with daily shock heaped upon daily shock”. These dramatic events are now the subject of a series on Stan. Journalist Nick Davies recounted them in his 2014 book, Hack Attack: How the Truth caught up with Rupert Murdoch. That book has now been reissued with a new afterword, exploring the developments and revelations over the last decade.

I have read the new chapter, and it is not for the faint of heart. It sheds light on the inner workings of the Murdoch empire, revealing a web of deceit and corruption that goes far beyond the phone hacking scandal of 2011.

The book reveals how the Murdochs used their media outlets to advance their corporate interests, often at the expense of truth and fairness. For example, when Jude Law sued the paper for hacking his phone over the past six years, the response was to hack his phone again. This is standard Murdoch practice: when criticized, don't engage with the criticism – attack the critic.

Davies himself had a disconcerting experience. Years after it was compiled, he came across a file headed: Nick Davies Research. It dated back to July 2009, when he had done a story on phone hacking. At one stage, three reporters worked on it, with some input from higher up. It explored his 20-plus years in journalism and interviewed his associates, but came up with nothing not already on the public record. As he said, this was not legitimate journalism. “Their readers weren’t interested in me. They had never heard of me.”

The book also sheds light on the destruction of evidence, a tactic used by the Murdochs to evade accountability. In July, Lewis and a colleague were aware the police knew about the extent of the phone hacking. They told police they had to destroy them because a “well trusted source” had warned them a former employee, a Labour sympathiser, had stolen Rebekah Brooks’ emails and was selling them to Tom Watson and Gordon Brown.

The company claimed they got this warning on January 24, just before the launch of Operating Weeting. But strangely, they did not tell any detectives about it. Moreover, deleting millions of emails seems an odd response to the threat. Not surprisingly, detectives concluded the story of the plot was a “ruse”. Lewis was also one of two senior executives whose role was to liaise with the police undertaking Operation Weeting.

There has never been a media scandal in Britain or Australia remotely resembling the phone hacking scandal of 2011. Probably no major players in Britain – in politics or in the press – has an appetite for reviving it. So the new edition of the book by Nick Davies – whose investigative work was central to the whole affair – is unlikely to have major repercussions.

Nevertheless, the revelations in the book’s afterword add considerably not only to our knowledge of developments over the last decade, but to a deeper understanding of the politics and culture of the Murdoch empire. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the darker side of journalism and the corrupting influence of power.