Reuters/London
British police arrested a former senior figure at Rupert Murdoch’s News International group yesterday, the latest high-profile case by detectives investigating the phone-hacking scandal at the News of the World tabloid.Police said a 71-year-old man had been arrested on suspicion of corruption and conspiring to intercept communications after he arrived by appointment at a north London police station. A source with knowledge of the matter said the man was Stuart Kuttner, a former managing editor of the News of the World. There was no immediate comment from News International, the British newspaper arm of News Corporation.Kuttner’s arrest will keep up the growing pressure on Rupert Murdoch’s son James, News International’s chairman.Lawmakers have already indicated they want to recall James Murdoch, News Corporation’s heir apparent, to clarify evidence he provided to a parliamentary committee about a large payment made to one of the phone-hacking victims. Kuttner’s office was responsible for authorising payments from the paper.The arrest was made by detectives probing allegations that journalists and private investigators illegally intercepted voicemail messages on mobile phones of people ranging from celebrities and politicians to murder victims and the families of dead soldiers to find out gossip for stories.They are also looking into claims some reporters paid bribes to police officers in return for information. In 2007, the tabloid’s royal reporter Clive Goodman and a private detective were jailed for hacking the phones of aides to Britain’s royal family. News International had said the practice was limited to one “rogue reporter” but handed over new evidence to police in the wake of legal action from a number of victims. Kuttner is the 11th person to be arrested since detectives reopened their investigation in January. His role at the News of the World until he stood down in 2009 was to handle the budget for the paper and authorise payments for staff and specific stories. Lawmakers have been told that his office would have been responsible for any payments to private detectives.A flood of revelations in the last month has generated a furore that has shaken Murdoch’s media empire, as well as Britain’s press, police and political leaders and forced a series of high profile resignations. The 168-year-old News of the World was closed last month after allegations that 4,000 phones, including that of a murdered schoolgirl, had been hacked.Former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks, a former editor of the News of the World, also quit and was arrested by detectives probing the hacking and corruption allegations last month.London’s police chief Paul Stephenson and Britain’s most senior counter-terrorism officer John Yates have also resigned over criticism the police should have done more to investigate the hacking allegations.Website users’ data stolen, warns paperRupert Murdoch-owned tabloid The Sun has sent a message to readers warning them that computer hackers may have published their data online after an attack on the paper’s website last month. The paper’s publisher, News Group Newspapers (NGN), said in an e-mail that details of people who took part in competitions and polls on the Sun’s website may have been taken. NGN said names, addresses and phone numbers may have been published. It said no financial or password information was affected. Hacking group LulzSec claimed responsibility for the cyber attack, which forced Murdoch’s British papers to pull their websites and culminated in The Sun’s site being replaced with a hoax story reporting the mogul had died. “As you may be aware, on July 19 the Sun website was subject to an organised criminal attack,” said the e-mail to Sun readers sent out by Chris Duncan, director of customer management at News International.