A short while ago, Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper company agreed to pay damages to 36 high-profile victims of tabloid phone-hacking. On top of this, News Corp has acknowledged to victims that executives covered up the scale of the unlawful activity by destroying evidence and lying to investigators.

The 36 settlements are just the tip of the iceberg and some 6 000 incidents of phone-hacking may have occurred over the years.

Among the high profile settlements to have taken place today, which in financial terms ran into the tens of thousands of pounds, included actor Jude Law, soccer player Ashley Cole and former British Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott.

With specific reference to Law’s case, it was accepted that 16 articles had been published in the tabloid between 2003 and 2006, and that information contained in the articles had been obtained by phone hacking. The actor had also been placed under “repeated and sustained physical surveillance.”

His ex-wife and actress, Sadie Frost, received £50 000.

They were just some of the 60 victims that were suing News Group Newspapers after their mobile phone voicemails were hacked by the defunct News of the World tabloid.

Today, lawyers for victims who have reached settlements said that the agreements were based on News Group Newspapers acknowledging senior executives tried to hide evidence.

An excerpt from the statement read:

News Group has agreed to compensation being assessed on the basis that senior employees and directors of NGN knew about the wrongdoing and sought to conceal it by deliberately deceiving investigators and destroying evidence.

As a result, documents relating to the nature and scale of the conspiracy, a cover up and the destruction of evidence/email archives by News Group have now been disclosed to the claimants.

In the face of this overwhelming evidence, the ‘rogue reporter’ position has disintegrated and the range, scale and extent of phone-hacking has become clear.

Lawyers said they’d obtained documents from News International that had revealed its attempts to destroy evidence.

This was partly due to the fact that the 12 solicitors’ firms involved in proceedings for the victims had joined forces to work together.

The latest twist in the phone-hacking scandal will without a doubt cast further doubt on the authenticity of evidence already given in the judge-led inquiry into Britain’s press ethics.

News International decided that it would rather not comment on the statement.

[Sources: AP, Reuters]