The News of the World Phone Hacking Scandal

The discussion of the military mortalnel Ph ane Hacking S fuckingdal from moving in moral philosophy and CSR Point of View Date 21 June 2012 Executive abbreviation The focus of the project youre about to read is on the of late ph sensation hacking stain of famous UK intelligence instruction agency, The parole of The ground. The work embroil a brief explanation of what has happened based on pre-selected online articles, abridgment of the grime from cable Ethics point of placement by using assorted CSR theories discussed during the CSR course in plosive consonant four and provides conclusion and recommendations on what could reach been dvirtuoso.The research is built on identification of the honorable bother identification, analysis of the s brush offdal, optional bodily functions which could have been pee-peen to avoid the situation, evaluation of the s arseholedal from commercial enterprise ethics perspective by using business ethics theories. To introduce sure that the scandal is study realistically the report covers different s plowholder perspectives. No networkheless, the report addresses one of the most important scandals of the news show program industry and fetchs to handle the issues from Business Ethics and CSR point of view.Contents Introduction3 The intelligence of the knowledge base and predict hacking Scandal downplay4 1. What the plight is about5 2. Stakeholder Analysis6 2. 1. Who acted and who had to act? 6 2. 2. Stakeholder and their interests/actions7 2. 3. clean value9 3. hypothetical analysis10 3. 2. Sustainability10 3. 3. estimable Value discretion11 3. 4. virtuousness Ethics ( echo Hacking)12 3. 5. Utilitarianism Consequentialist admission13 3. 6. Universalism Deontological approach14 4. Conclusion and recommendations15 Bibliography16 IntroductionThe scandal analyzed deep down this report is one of the most discussed and complicated scandals the news world has constantly faced. In ordination to be able to realistically present society and adequately measure out this whistle blowing journalistic research which revealed the greatest journalistic scandal ever the followers criterion were used * Business Aspect of the scandal * Moral aspect of the issue and unrestricted reaction * Political aspect of the problem * honest theoretical relevancy * affectionate elements of the scandalAll the gathered data is analyzed accord to the theoretical knowledge gained during the course. Company Mission Statement Our make out is the fearless advocacy of truth. We will seek for the patronage of no caller will conceal neither the merits nor the faults of any party, solely will aim alone at doing just function to old England by maintaining her repute and security, the prosperity of all classes of the bulk. (Hinton. (2011). After 168 age, what changed?. Available http//hintonandco. com/tag/mission-statement/. abide accessed 14 June 2012. This in itself is a very compelling mi ssion statement which was leftover as an inheritance from the partnerships founding fathers. After 168 years they first have been in business, the rung were empowered by these powerful words. The culture that was initially advocated for truth was left to splinter uncontrolled eve if it was for the cost of breaking the law. The News of the World and Phone hacking Scandal background For the first time macrocosm published in 1843 the News of the World was one of the most read Newspaper in the United Kingdom, until 2011.During the period of its nationalation it was the biggest tell oning English language newspaper non only if in the UK precisely too globally. The guild initially was established by John Browne Bell in 1843 and later was sold to Lascelles Carr in 1891 and last was bought by News Corporation in 1969. News of the World was the Sunday sister paper of The Sun. The newspaper main focus was on its specialty on celebrity-based scoops and populist news. Its extraordi nary scandal news pull in the gild various nurtures, including nevertheless non limited to famous News of the Screws and Screws of the World slogan. UK BBC. (2011). News of the World to airless amid hacking scandal. Available www. bbc. co. uk/news/uk-14070733. Last accessed 14 June 2012. ) The companion was famous for exposing celebrities as drug users, sexual peccadilloes, or criminals, setting up insiders and journalists in disguise to provide either word-painting or photographic evidence, and phone hacking which became obvious in 2011. With its paparazzi style and delivering personalised news, the paper was sell over 2 million copies on hebdomadary basis up until 2010.Though the phone hacking allegations started back in 2006, accusations reached to its top take aim on the 4th of July 2011, when it was revealed that the newspaper staff had intercepted and deleted the voicemail of missing British teen Milly Dowler, who was later found murdered. As a resolve of the inten se allegations News International announced the closure of the newspaper on July the 7th 2011. still the scandal did non just end there by climax the caller-out, it got deepened as the investigations got intensive.The most horrible news was that the company had hacked the phones of the British service personnel killed in action, their families, people who died during 9/11 and their families. nevertheless respectable dilemmas do not just end by the phone hacking scandal, but also secondary dilemma starts with the speech of the owner of the News Corp. Richard Murdochs announcement on February the 17th 2012 in London that they were soon to propel a Sunday edition of The Sun as a replacement to the News of the World and they were planning to employ a number of antecedent News of the World journalists. . What the dilemma is about When the investigations initially started in 2005 it was reason that the companys phone hackings were only limited to celebrities, politicians and a hardly a(prenominal) members of the British Royal Family. However when it was revealed in July 2011, that the phones of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowlers , relatives of decedent military members, victims of the 7/7 London bombings and some of the 9/11 victims were also accessed. As a result of those unethical actions a public outcry against News Corporation and owner Rupert Murdoch culminated. (UK BBC. 2011). News of the World to close amid hacking scandal. Available www. bbc. co. uk/news/uk-14070733. Last accessed 14 June 2012. ) Even though the public relatively calmed down aft(prenominal) the company was closed, the anti-Murdoch and anti-News Corp. protests culminated once again after the owner of the company announced that they are planning to start a new newspaper agency by hiring the same staff down the stairs different name. 1. Stakeholder Analysis 2. 1. Who acted and who had to act? Phone hacking scandal covered multi direct stakeholders. The following were the majo r stakeholdersIn this case the main responsible stakeholders were the News Corp Management, Richard Murdoch the owner of the company and the British Government/monitoring institutions within the brass. These stakeholders were licitly responsible for making it sure that the newspaper was operating within the legal borders. Once the company was suspected for its fraud activities the organizational institutions did their line of merchandise by starting an investigation on the newspapers operations. However these institutions did fail to monitor the newspaper activities prior to the scandal.Both the News Corp. and the owner of the company, Richard Murdoch claimed not to be knowledgeable of those hacking activities, however they did apologize those harmed as a result of hacking activities and subsequently shut the company down. Meanwhile, the holding company did fail their promises when they announced about their plans of re-starting the newspapers successor under different name. 2. 2. Stakeholder and their interests/actions The stakeholders disposed(p) in the stakeholder map can be divided into two * inherent * ExternalThe following could be classified as internal stakeholders 1. The News of the World It was in the newspapers objective to deliver fire news at on weekly basis. The company was profit oriented and would do almost everything to execute its targets. They also had the campaign to expose pedophiles rings rather hollow. That was a heartbreaking path to go on we could imagine them asking the question, Will this sell us lots of copies? , and if the answer is Yes, they would do it, no matter if its illegal, im clean-living or indefensible.The culture that was initially advocated for truth was left to run uncontrolled even off if it was for the cost of breaking the law. 2. The NotW precaution The instruction had the certificate of indebtedness to make strategic decisions to run the company profitably. It was in their interest to snuff it the st aff as much independence as possible to consume the most sensational news in the news industry. However it was also their responsibility to make sure that the staffs actions were within the legal boundaries. 3. The staff/journalists The employees main duties were delivering the news that no other paper delivered.However it was chastely their responsibility to act responsibly. 4. Richard Murdoch It was in his focus that the company was profitable. It was also him as primary responsible person when the company was subject to investigations. He was the one apologizing in public on behalf of the newspaper, which created a good image of the company in short term. However, his announcement about new company universe launched again put the News Corp. as holding company in the frontline subject to criticisms. 5. The NOTW shareholders This group of the stakeholders was the people who invested in the NOTW.It was in their interest that the company was profitable and was running that way con tinuously. It was definitely out of their focus that the company was engaged such harmful activities. The orthogonal stakeholders 1. The UK government/regulatory institutions It was governments/regulatory institutions duty to check the activities of the newspaper and act upon necessity. 2. David Cameroon The prime(a) minister was criticized for his former director of communications Andy Coulson was an ex-editor of News of the World at the time much of the phone hacking occurred. (Luke Buckmaster and Amber Jamieson. 2011). Hacked to death Murdoch kills NotW. Available http//www. crikey. com. au/2011/07/08/the-latest-24-hours-of-the-NotW-phone-hacking-scandal/. Last accessed 14 June 2012. ) 3. Victims The victims who were alive or the relatives of the victims were interested in NotW counsellings apalogizes. 4. New industry The industry got harmed by one cases action, and the eyes turned towards other news agencies asking one question Are they also using same or homogeneous method ? 5. The community The majority was interested in NotW to apologize and even shut down.However there were small group of people who could potentially be against these and these people were majorly the NotW employees or their relatives. In addition, the community was the main reason why the company did those actions as the affect was very high for such news. The dilemma in the case which makes the stakeholder interests collide * The NotW company interests for higher profitability * The NotW management objective to bring news at any cost * assertable corruption within the government * High level of public demand for scandal newsSumming it up, there are over 10 major stakeholders being divided into two parts, internal and external stakeholders. However the most interesting part is that some of the stakeholders have mixed interests. For instance, the government who used the information provided by the newspaper, used and sought more news without checking the source of the news and la ter on accusing the NotW for fraud. In addition, the community who which was the main calculate for the hacking due to the demand also had mixed interest levels. 2. 3. Moral values The question What is Moral in itself is debatable.However one can accept that moral values are values share by the majority. If there would not have been any value in common in the community, it would be impossible or extremely hard to decide on what is moral. In fact, one can see that some values are shared with higher acceptance late than others. The phone hacking scandal covers various moral values elements * Responsibility * Accountability * Cooperation * Honesty * Commitment * Integrity * equating The actions taken by all the stakeholders must meet at least(prenominal) one of the above granted elements in order to be considered moral. 2. Theoretical analysis . 1. Carrolls Pyramid Based on Carrolls gain a company has four levels of responsibility which are Economic, Legal, Ethical and large-hear ted responsibilities. Analyzing the NotWs overall operational structure we can settle that their major focus was on Economic responsibility, making more profit in shortest time possible. Their mission statement did touch Legal and Ethical responsibilities as salutary, however it was not very much clear what their major Ethical responsibilities were. They tried to create ethically responsible image of the company by donating money and hosting charity events.However this in itself was not enough. One can think that NotW was settled at the base line of the Carrolls pyramid. 3. 4. Sustainability Evaluating the NotW from sustainability curves point of view one can spot the target of the management. 1- Ethical Responsibility The company website and their PR representatives always mentioned that their mission is to bring reliable and honest news. opus they were often giving large money donations for good cause. However for the model of the Phone Hacking Scandal, we can say that one ac tion overcame all the Ethical actions of the company. Economic Responsibility This was the main responsibility of the company as they were the largest selling English Language newspaper of the world. 3- Legal Responsibility The company and the staff were held legally responsible for their actions however the management did not act legally responsible prior to the scandal outbreak. Summing it up we can conclude that the company did not meet all the sustainability elements and lacked sound CSR policy. 3. 5. Ethical Value Judgment We inherit ethical standards suiting our community the most.As people, the companies are as well judged upon firm views about right and wrong. Some of those ethical views are so strong that, shaking them will shake the whole fundamentals. Reliability and institutionalise are those of major elements in these ethical standards that any news company would be judged upon. Looking at the NotW, we can confirm that, the company not only ignored the prevailing norm s of the industry but also agitate the fundaments of the ethical expectations from a news agency. (James Griffin (2006). Value Judgment up(p) Our Ethical Believes. 2nd ed.New York, the USA Oxford University Press. p 60- 98. ) However finally the management took the right psychological decision by stopping the company operations. NotW NotW Phone Hacking Scandal Prevailing norms of News industry Value judgments and perceptions of the audiance ETHICAL? 3. 6. sexual morality Ethics (Phone Hacking) Virtue ethics is shortly the buildment of a person or a company into an ethically responsible one to channelize ethical and responsible life/operations. To achieve that level it is important to develop responsible character traits which are called fairnesss.In Phone Hacking Scandal both the government and the management had to determine specific virtues and play the role of Virtue Ethics Agent. Based on virtue ethics, to determine whether an action is chastely acceptable, the action mus t be chosen responsibly making the virtue tinct to responsibility. In most of the case the agent must choose the virtue on the victim and help them. We could see that the British Government acted virtuously and increased the investigation on the hacking scandal, which eventually lead to the end of the NotW.This is loosely due to the fact that NotW as a company lacked major news agency virtues which are being trustworthy, reliable, and honest and one can conclude that the government played an important virtue agent role. 3. 7. Utilitarianism Consequentialist approach fit to the consequentialists it is morally right to do anything if it results in the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people. However the main issue becomes the consequence of the speculation which would allow any action to take place under the name of a good cause. Even actions hat would be considered as morally wrong can be accepted within this theory. However fit to the utilitarianism, the NotW has created more harm in the community than benefit by hacking peoples private voice mails and, for this reason they are considered to be unrighteous for taking morally wrong actions. Looking at from different perspective, if the scandal was not found out, and people enjoyed reading the hacked news, one could say that as long as nobody finds it out, everybody is happy, the consequence is good. Happy & satisfied customer, tax revenue generating company, taxes received at the government, positive consequence.Once again it is confirmed that this theory can not clearly formulate satisfactory rules for decision making and can easily breach justice/legislation. For the above given reason, one could conclude that the Utilitarianism is not the best way of assessing an action by means of morality. 3. 8. Universalism Deontological approach Kants deontological ethics theory is based on Deon duty. If the scandal is approached from Kants categorical imperative form principle point of view, we can conclude that it is the duty of any News Agency to deliver the news to its customers within the given standards without violating the others private lives.Since this theory is built on the actions that lead to the outcome, then we can conclude that it was not only the NotW but also the regulatory institutions who acted baseborn by not monitoring the NotW properly and providing the ground for the company to take such actions. 3. Conclusion and recommendations Failing almost every Ethical Theory, not having sound CSR system, being majorly financials oriented firm, the News of the Worlds Phone Hacking activities were completely against not only the British Business ethical standards but also the international ethical standards.The NotW management had various mistakes, including but not limited to giving power to their staff without monitoring them on according to the standards. Which consequently lead for the largest scandal of the news industry. However, the management did take the right step by announcing the NotW closed which created a caring image in the community, and saved the holding News Corp. company. Meanwhile, Mr. Murdochs announcement of News Corp. first appearance a new successor of the NotW created more aggression within the public. The following would be final recommendations for the News Corp. s the NotW is no longer exists 1- ante up your staff power, but do not let the aggression take their power over 2- Corporate Social Responsibility is not donations, but acting. After such incident, the management should start different volunteer activities not only in the UK but also the other parts of the globe. 3- dress a sound CSR policy covering both your internal and external activities 4- Add learning objectives which you have acquired and which you are missing from your mal-management to your website to let your customers consider that you are aware of your mistake and have learnt from it. Do not bedim your history 6- Engage with your cust omers via different tools, including but not limited to Social Media means and ask for their opinions where they would like to see you as a company. 7- have sure that you have decent reporting system set, and are on track of every single development within the company. Realizing the above given recommendations, the News Corp. will slowly, however soundly be restoring the customer authorization and rise back to their previous levels once again. Bibliography * http//www. bbc. co. uk/news/uk-14070733 * http//www. crikey. com. u/2011/07/08/the-latest-24-hours-of-the-NotW-phone-hacking-scandal/. * http//www. csrquest. net/default. aspx? articleID=12770&heading= * http//www. ec. europa. eu/enterprise/policies/sustainable-business/corporate-social-responsibility/reporting-disclosure/swedish-presidency/files/media-csr/corporate_responsibilty_and_the_media,_david_grayson_en. pdf * http//www. goodcorporation. com/documents/Corporatesocialresponsibilitymorethanaluxury. pdf * http//www. guard ian. co. uk/news/ communicate/2011/jul/11/news-world-hacking-scandal-live * http//www. guardian. co. uk/sustainable-business/blog/csr-now-hacking-scandal *