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Vodafone hacking journalist's phone "attack on democracy": minister

Xinhua, September 18, 2015 Adjust font size:

A senior official of Australia's New South Wales (NSW) state slashed on Friday the hacking of a local journalist's phone by telecom giant Vodafone as an "attack on democracy" and the response by the company was "offensively inadequate."

Fairfax Media journalist Natalie O'Brien wrote an article in 2011 exposing flaws in Vodafone's privacy and security systems and company executives were furious and wanted to find the source of her information.

Vodafone was aware of the hacking in 2012, but blamed it on a " rogue" employee yet didn't inform authorities as required.

The revelation of the hacking only became public last Saturday, with the company executive officially denying it ordered the hack.

"The response from Vodafone is essentially that the incident was a result of a rogue employee," NSW Regulation Minister Victor Dominello said in an open letter to the company on Friday about the hacking of the journalist's mobile phone on Friday.

"This three wise monkeys defense is offensively inadequate."

He said a particular concern was Vodafone's "failure to take appropriate action at the time of becoming aware of the breaches" to "alert police and individuals concerned," demonstrating a " flagrant disregard for privacy" by Vodafone.

After the hack was revealed on Saturday, Vodafone admitted it knew of it as early as June 2012, but took no action to report the crime to authorities.

The hacking puts scrutiny on the chief executive of the multi- billion-dollar National Broadband Network, Bill Morrow, who was CEO of Vodafone Hutchison Australia when the hack was covered up.

Morrow claimed he was unaware of the hack. Endi