Rebekah Brooks, the chief executive of News UK, is on a list of 115 journalists whose names have been disclosed as having made requests for information from a private detective who was subsequently convicted of illegally obtaining private information.
Others on the list include Tom Newton Dunn, now the political editor of the Sun, David Wooding, political editor of the Sun on Sunday, former Observer journalists, Antony Barnett and Martin Bright, and Ian Cobain, who is wrongly listed as working on the Sunday Times at the time but now works at the Guardian. Brooks is listed under her maiden name of Rebekah Wade.
The list was based on spreadsheets and notebooks seized in 2003 by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) during a raid on the home of private detective Steve Whittamore, as part of Operation Motorman.
The investigation found evidence that some of the personal information gathered by Whittamore had been obtained illegally by him, including through “blagging” – obtaining information by deception over the phone. He subsequently pleaded guilty to “conspiring to commit misconduct in public office” and was given a conditional discharge.
Whittamore’s services included obtaining ex-directory numbers, “family and friends” telephone number lists, mobile numbers and car registration numbers. He also provided publicly available information from sources such as electoral registers and Companies House records.
The disclosure of the list of 115 names was ordered by the upper tribunal in August when the judge, Nicholas Wikeley, dismissed an appeal by the ICO that the names should remain secret as they were “sensitive personal data”.
In his ruling, Wikeley made clear that the presence of a journalist’s name on the list meant nothing more than that journalist in question “had commissioned Mr Whittamore to obtain information. The information did not carry with it any assertion as to the actual or alleged commission of any crime by those journalists.”
An investigation by the Observer’s external ombudsman, John Willis, took place in 2012. Willis was given access to the evidence in the case and concluded that the paper’s former journalists “overwhelmingly used Whittamore’s services in their efforts to expose public impropriety or crime. To conclude otherwise would not be just or fair.”
A News UK spokesman said: “All the issues around Operation Motorman have been thoroughly investigated by the police, the Information Commissioner’s Office, parliament and the Leveson inquiry. The information commissioner himself stated in a 2010 decision notice that ‘not all the journalists whose names are held were necessarily involved in unlawful activity’. At News UK, the use of search agents or private investigators is tightly monitored and regulated.”
The 115 names are part of a wider ICO list of 305 journalists who made 4,000 requests for information from Whittamore. The shorter list which has been disclosed involved those where there was “at least a question mark over the legality of the transaction”. A 2006 ICO report, What price privacy now? (pdf), said they came from a wide range of newspapers and magazines, with the Daily Mail and Sunday People heading the list of requests.
