Reading this -seems like you have hit the nail on the head. Sad outcome though for the folk who have lost their jobs and in taking a new position elsewhere  maybe their pensions? If only we knew the facts behind all this, but i reckon it will be more protected than UFO files.

Yep suzy. It's gonna be a hell of a ride hopefully   

Originally Posted by Jonesy: Reading this -seems like you have hit the nail on the head. Sad outcome though for the folk who have lost their jobs and in taking a new position elsewhere  maybe their pensions? If only we knew the facts behind all this, but i reckon it will be more protected than UFO files.

It's not only been protected, it's been wiped off the face of the world. My dad's been out of the game for years now and even he knows about the (highly skilled) IT bods employed full-time to make every trace and cyber footstep disappear. Funnily enough, most of Coulson's internet traffic is still floating about, hence his sacrificing at the high altar. Brooks looks like she's never sent an email in her life  Strange isn't it?

I hope there is Sprout.- would make for more heads rolling. No hard feelings i hope on our past posts- just a matter of different views i hope. I am sure there will be lots of these to come, but it all makes for a better forum chat when we can disagree and hopefully still be friends.

I almost want to take a picnic in Parliament Square next week and just have a gawp. 

Jonesy I never want to get into bother with anyone. If I feel that happening I'll just simply walk away.  I just need to clarify things at times. 

Originally Posted by Jonesy: Reading this -seems like you have hit the nail on the head. Sad outcome though for the folk who have lost their jobs and in taking a new position elsewhere  maybe their pensions? If only we knew the facts behind all this, but i reckon it will be more protected than UFO files.

It's not only been protected, it's been wiped off the face of the world. My dad's been out of the game for years now and even he knows about the (highly skilled) IT bods employed full-time to make every trace and cyber footstep disappear. Funnily enough, most of Coulson's internet traffic is still floating about, hence his sacrificing at the high altar. Brooks looks like she's never sent an email in her life  Strange isn't it?

I thought something like this may have happened, but not at this level. They may have back-ups of the info and this is what she is referring to in her speech. We as ordinary individuals know nothing about what goes on in the higher escalations of society. We are just finding out with this latest scandal. How many more have gone before this???? Talk about democracy? Why anyone would want to adopt a western democracy beggars belief.

Still Mates Spout. and thanks for helping to keep a good thread going.

Originally Posted by suzybean:

Originally Posted by Jonesy: Reading this -seems like you have hit the nail on the head. Sad outcome though for the folk who have lost their jobs and in taking a new position elsewhere  maybe their pensions? If only we knew the facts behind all this, but i reckon it will be more protected than UFO files.

It's not only been protected, it's been wiped off the face of the world. My dad's been out of the game for years now and even he knows about the (highly skilled) IT bods employed full-time to make every trace and cyber footstep disappear. Funnily enough, most of Coulson's internet traffic is still floating about, hence his sacrificing at the high altar. Brooks looks like she's never sent an email in her life  Strange isn't it?

I thought something like this may have happened, but not at this level. They may have back-ups of the info and this is what she is referring to in her speech. We as ordinary individuals know nothing about what goes on in the higher escalations of society. We are just finding out with this latest scandal. How many more have gone before this???? Talk about democracy? Why anyone would want to adopt a western democracy beggars belief.

These things happen all the time. Democracy allows this to happen, some would say it's a flaw to the system, some would say it's just something we should accept as a society because in the grand scheme of things it is something that can be ironed out eventually. The irony of this whole situation is that corruption is best sniffed out by a 'free' press, the same press that is abusing it's power at the moment. The worst thing that could happen, in my opinion, is for there to be so many restrictions and sanctions on the print and visual media that we'll never be privvy to political scandal and corruption again. Like I said before, there are a multitude of layers to this story. It effects society in so many ways...political, culturally, economically and ethically. We'll just have to wait and see how it all pans out, but don't worry Jonesy I honestly believe we are a long way from a failure of democracy 

The problem - as anyone who's involved with IT can tell you - is outsourcing. Once those little bits and bytes start moving around, it's impossible to keep a tab on them, and therefore impossible to ever fully delete them.

It looks like this particular scandal (with ramficiations for the Tommy Sheridan case as well as others) came about because NI were using an external IT company; Essential Computing in Bristol.

Even if the data is unrecoverable (and that's a big if: given enough technology it's possible to recover at least some data from virtually any hard drive - those "1"s and "0"s are hardy beasts ), there should still be enough electronic and witness evidence to charge the "NI executive" responsible with attempting to delete the data, and that would be a real biggy in itself.

The following is an extract from the Guardian online:

The archive was said to contain half a terabyte of data – equivalent to 500 editions of Encyclopaedia Britannica. But police now believe that there was an effort to substantially destroy it before NI handed over their new evidence in January. Police believe they have identified the executive responsible by following an electronic audit trail. They have also attempted to retrieve the lost data. The Crown Prosecution Service is believed to have been asked whether the executive can be charged with perverting the course of justice.

At the heart of the affair is a data company, Essential Computing, based near Bristol. Staff there have been interviewed by Operation Weeting. One source speculated that this company had compelled NI to admit that the archive existed.

The Guardian understands that Essential Computing has co-operated with police and provided evidence about an alleged attempt by the NI executive to destroy part of the archive while they were working with it. This is said to have happened after the executive discovered that the company retained material of which NI was unaware.

I think you've hit the nail there.

As the Guardian piece I quoted above says, Essential Computing had "retained material of which NI was unaware". A large part of the recent NI panic is because they became aware of it...

Murdoch's reach is far and wide! If he can make Kings of Men, he can nobble just the right amount of outsourced personnel. I'm going to bed now, conspiracy theories knacker me out, but there is so much more hidden in all of this than will ever come out, and even the most experienced code breaker hacker would have a job of it 

edit: I am referring specifically to Rebekah Brooks' culpability in this. Coulson's part will be in a blog by Monday 

I can't wait to see the headline on the NOTW tomorrow. 

It's something like...Goodbye and Thank You.

Night all 

  I imagined it being a *get a free Harry Potter and the deathly hallows ticket at the odeon* just to get people to buy it.

Sadly, they won't need to do anything like that: it's expected to sell extremely well, and they've doubled their usual print run to 5 million copies. The expected increase is mainly down to souvenir hunters, but apparently they're also giving all proceeds to charity.

Still not enough to make me prepared to ever touch the rag with the proverbial 10' pole, though...

It will be interesting to see what the sales of the final issue are. I for one can't understand why people would buy it just because its the last issue, they don't deserve any recognition apart from shame.

Ooo-err I sound right bitter don't I? I've never read NOTW either

According to the BBC news reports, it was the best selling paper in the UK - 7.5 million people buy it apparently. I was gobsmacked and still can't think why anyone would want to part with cash for it

 It's nothing like as high as 7.5 million: I suspect that might be the estimated number of people who have access to it and read at least part of it (i.e. several members of a family reading the same copy).

The sales figure that's been bandied-around a lot this week has been 2.6 million: that was apparently the size of the average print run.  They raised the print run to 5 million for the final edition.

The NOTW's sales figures dropped below 3 million in 2009. It was still the biggest selling Sunday paper in the UK, and (depending on who you listen to) arguably the country's biggest selling paper over all.

I do agree with you though in that I too find it incredible that so many people still bought it. Even more incredible is the fact that they felt able to put its online content behind a paywall...

If and when a movie is made about Rupert Murdoch (hopefully not a glossed over version by 20th Century Fox) Geoffrey Rush must be an absolute shoe-in for the lead role. I think his likeness to him is uncanny 

When quoting readership figures they will usually multiply the print run figure by 3.2 or maybe 4.2 and use some out of date demographics to back it up. The 7.5 million most probably includes digital readership, too.

Hello Karma, welcome back.

Ello! Am off again now but will pop back later to catch up on here

Readership for most papers is around 2.5 times sales...so 7.5million read it means 2.5million buy it.

See you later then.

I still think 7.5 mil is being generous. They probably included the amount of cats who also read it while they were shitting all over page 15.....Right, definitely have to skidaddle. Laters!

Thanks all, thats much clearer now

I would have thought most cats would be more discerning

So David Cameron said "I made a decision to give someone who had screwed up a 2nd chance" ?????

Previously DC had stated he had been assured by Andy Coulson that AC had not done anything wrong whilst editor of the NOTW. 

So what was it that AC had screwed up that DC was so forgiving about?

When AC appeared before the Department for Culture Media and Sport committee on 21 July 2009 re their examination of what had gone on at NOWT, he told them that he had no knowledge of what Glenn Mulcaire had done and did not personally sign off any cash payments to him. He told the committee that as he was the editor he had no choice but to resign back on 26 January 2007.

AC became director of communications for the Conservatives on 9 July 2007. Presumably he told DC at the time what he later told the committee as on 9 July 2009 AC said "I believe in giving people a second chance. As director of communications for the Conservatives he does an excellent job in a proper, upright way at all times."

Well everyone deserves a second chance IMO and it's lovely that Downing Street has become an off shoot of the Probation Service 

Changing thread title to phone hacking seeing as the discussion in this thread surrounds that.

It's all getting abit out of hand now... apparently Murdoch newspapers targeted Gordon Brown, got details of bank account, legal files, family medical records.

Also, The Sun had a quick rant about Miliband & BBC killing the NOTW.

It soon got deleted and they said ignore it, everyone jumped on it and said its not nice to be hacked is it

Anyone feeling really sorry for Brooks and co. having cameras shoved in their faces, everywhere they go?

No, me neither. 

And on the BBC website:

The Browns also fear medical records relating to their son Fraser, whom the Sun revealed in 2006 had cystic fibrosis, may have been accessed illegally.