Celebrity 'phone hacking' on the increase

[InfoSec News <isn () c4i org>]

http://media.guardian.co.uk/newmedia/story/0,7496,810374,00.html

Julia Day
Monday October 14, 2002 

PR advisers to the rich and famous are warning their clients to be on
their guard amid claims that journalists are resorting to increasingly
underhand methods to hack into celebrities' mobile phones.

As competition for celebrity stories increases, unscrupulous
journalists are using hacking techniques to beat their rivals to
scoops.

According to one well known PR man, some journalists are even tapping
into phones to sabotage their rivals' chances in story bidding wars by
deleting messages.

Hacking into strangers' mobile phone voicemail boxes is a relatively
simple process but can only be used if the mobile phone user has not
personalised his or her voicemail access code.

"There is a certain element in Fleet Street that sees this as a new
form of investigative journalism and it's getting worse," said James
Herring of Taylor Herring Communications, whose clients include
Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, Neil Morrissey and Caroline
Feraday.

"We always advise our clients to change the default pin number on
their mobile phones straight away as this bars strangers from
accessing their voicemail.

"But now not only are celebrities being targeted, as journalists trawl
for stories, but so are the people negotiating bids for stories.

"Newspapers are accessing people's voicemails and deleting the
messages left by their rivals.

"This started as a dirty tricks ploy by the red-top Sunday papers but
voicemail espionage has become epidemic."

Oliver Wheeler of Freud Communications, whose clients include Natalie
and Nicole Appleton and Geri Halliwell, said the tabloids were not the
only ones indulging in the practice.

"I advised all our clients to make sure they changed their pin numbers
after I saw a journalist accessing someone else's voicemail. I was
stunned - he was a senior business journalist," said Mr Wheeler.

James Hipwell, the former Daily Mirror City Slicker, who now works for
celebrity PR guru Max Clifford, said this tactic was now common
practice in Fleet Street.

"There are many stories every week - mainly showbusiness - that
couldn't have been got by any other means," he said.

"It's underhand and it's not encouraged but it is common practice and
everyone does it."



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