A trail leads you to Murdoch from Hamza

Prominent Islamic militants in London were targeted by a private investigator working for Rupert Murdoch’s now-closed News of the World tabloid.

The data, which was collected by British government investigators in 2006 as they looked into alleged media abuses, show that a NOTW journalist commissioned private investigator Steve Whittamore to gather data on Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada, two of London’s most controversial militant clerics.

Mohammed al Massari, a Saudi dissident who lives in London, was also targeted in the same way. The information does not indicate whether the newspaper or private eye hacked into any of the militants’ voicemails, an illegal tactic used by another detective employed by paper who was jailed in 2007 along with a reporter for hacking into the voicemails of celebrities and aides to Britain’s royal family. News International, Murdoch’s London newspaper publishing operation, said it was looking into the matter.

The information on the NOTW’s Islamic militant targets is contained in an electronic database known as the “blue book”, which was assembled by the Information Commissioner’s Office, a British government agency, from evidence seized in a 2003 raid on Whittamore’s home. The database is undated but is believed to cover a period between 2000 and 2003. It offers no clues on what, if anything, the NOTW dug up on the targets.

NOTW ran a story in 2003 exposing what it said was a bigamous marriage by Abu Hamza, which they said had helped him to win the right to reside in Britain. The woman he wed later denied that she had already been married at the time. Whittamore, who could not be reached for comment, was convicted in 2005 of passing sensitive information to journalists.