Further to my blogpost yesterday, Police use of Ripa law threatens our civil liberties and press freedom, the National Union of Journalists has called for an urgent investigation into police spying on reporters.
The NUJ has condemned the misuse of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) by Kent police to obtain the phone records of Mail on Sunday news editor David Dillon and freelance journalist Andrew Alderson.
The union also refers to the Metropolitan police's admission that its officers covertly obtained the phone records of the Sun's political editor Tom Newton Dunn.
Press Gazette discovered, via a freedom of information request, that the Met doesn't record cases of Ripa being used to access journalists' communications.
So the NUJ is now calling on the Interception of Communications Commissioner, Anthony May, to launch an urgent review of the police's powers to use Ripa in order to access journalistic material and sources.
Michelle Stanistreet, the NUJ general secretary, said:
"It is becoming clear that the misuse of Ripa to snoop on journalists is not an isolated example of bad practice in the Met.
The police clearly believe they are above the law they are there to uphold. Their utter contempt for journalism and a free press will be a paralysing impact on whistleblowers who will think twice before ever picking up the phone to a journalist again.
Information that deserves to be in the public domain won't see the light of day. The damage to public trust in journalism is immense."
Source: NUJ
