The Magazine of Corporate Responsibility

Tag Archive for ‘News Corp.’

Scandalous Leadership and Organization Culture: A Theme Runs Through It

While there’s no excuse for recent leadership scandals, Art Stewart writes, “it is also irresponsible to dismiss outright our own role in engendering a culture of duplicity, incompetence, and corruption as if it all could manifest from unsupported solo acts.”

The Basics on the Latest Murdoch Scandal

Yet another scandal is bubbling up at Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. The Murdoch-owned Dow Jones announced that the publisher of The Wall Street Journal’s European edition was resigning, without mentioning why. The next day, The Wall Street Journal reported that the top European exec stepped down after an internal ethics investigation found he had pressured reporters to write two positive stories about a Dutch firm with which the paper had an agreement that helped boost circulation figures.

Embarassing Hacking Allegations That News Corp. Redacted

New documents published today cast doubt on News Corporation’s claims that top executives and editors at the now-defunct News of the World were unaware of widespread phone hacking at the paper. One of the documents had also been aggressively redacted by News Corp., which removed references that referred to top editors knowing about the hacking.

After the Debacle: How News Corp. Can Rebuild Trust

The Murdochs and their executive team at News Corp. need to begin building “a new corporate conscience,” argues Patricis Harned, President of the Ethics Resource Center. “NewsCorp is now literally fighting for its life,” she writes. “The best defense, as we have seen with companies that have survived such crises, is not to spin its story, but to start writing a new one.”

Facing Bribery Inquiry, News Corp. Lawyers Up With Former Federal Prosecutors

The embattled media conglomerate News Corporation and its independent directors have not only hired top criminal defense lawyers, they’ve also hired former Justice Department prosecutors well-versed in U.S. bribery law. The new hires are a sign that the company is taking the Justice Department’s preliminary investigation rather seriously.

A Reader’s Guide to U.K. Phone Hacking Scandal

Though News of the World shut its doors on Sunday, the UK’s hacking scandal is deepening. Allegations of illegal activity have spread beyond News of the World to other Murdoch papers, and far beyond hacking into people’s voice mails. With all the new details emerging, it’s getting hard to keep track. Here’s a brief rundown of the latest revelations.

How Murdoch Reporters’ Bribes to British Cops Violate U.S. Law

As the phone hacking scandal continues to unfold, British press reports say more than $160,000 was paid by News of the World reporters to police officers in the U.K. News of the World is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. – whose stock is listed in the U.S. – and the alleged bribes could cause the company serious trouble with U.S. prosecutors or the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Citizens United: Waking a Sleeping Giant

A constitutional law expert says the U.S. Supreme Court ’s January ruling in the Citizens United campaign spending case raises a host of corporate governance issues that should be addressed by legislation before the 2012 Presidential election. “One of the reasons that this is such an objectionable decision,” she argues, “is it allows corporate managers in publicly traded companies to spend what Justice Brandeis called ‘other people’s money.’”

Senator Questions 30 Companies on Human Rights in China

U.S. Senator Dick Durbin this week sent letters to 30 information and communications technology companies – including Apple, Facebook, Skype and Twitter – seeking information about their human rights practices in China. Durbin also announced plans to hold a follow-up hearing on global internet freedom next month.