the phone hacking scandal

Though I generally hate it when people say “I’m not surprised” about everything, this is one case where I’m not surprised. I read an article some years go by a guy who used to work as a tabloid reporter, and he was quite blunt in saying that they had ways of hacking the answering machines of Hollywood figures. Some other things they did…

*the entry level job is to hang around hotel lobbies in Los Angeles, look for celebrities coming in, and try to figure out what’s bringing them there

*digging through garbage

*worst of all: manufacturing reportable incidents. In one case, a tabloid employee phoned the California Department of Child and Family Services, and falsely reported that “my daughter goes to kindergarten with Roseanne Barr’s daughter, and Roseanne’s daughter looks abused to me.” Under California law, all such reports must be investigated. So, the tabloid sent a photographer to Roseanne’s house, photographed the arriving investigator, and published the (true) headline: “Roseanne Investigated for Child Abuse.”

If you were a celebrity, you would want these people dead.