*NEWS*HP SETTLES SPYING CASE

[Anonymous]

HP settles spying case
Firm
reaches settlement with New York Times and BusinessWeekHP has reached a
settlement with The New York Times and three BusinessWeek reporters who
had accused the company of spying.The settlement was not the result of
a lawsuit and came after private negotiations between HP and
BusinessWeek’s Ben Elgin, Peter Burrows and Roger Crockett, as well as
New York Times reporter John Markoff. Financial terms were not
disclosed.

HP had already paid the California Attorney General’s
office $14.5m to settle its legal case over the spying charges.The
scandal erupted in September 2006 after an internal HP investigation
found evidence of misconduct by private investigators and company
employees over attempts to identify the source of a boardroom leak.It
was later revealed that the operation, dubbed Kona II, included lying
to phone companies in order to obtain private phone records, and
equipping email messages with spyware to report forwarding.

The
Kona II investigators were also alleged to have discussed placing
surveillance equipment and informants in two national newsrooms.”What
HP did was an affront to the free press,” Terry Gross, the San
Francisco lawyer representing the parties told The New York Times.”They
did not like what reporters were writing, and they broke into their
private telephone accounts to identify who their sources were.”HP said
in a written statement that it is “happy to resolve the matter”. But
the company still faces lawsuits filed by three CNET reporters and one
of their family members, as well as a journalist working for Associated
Press.

[Author]

February 18, 2008 at 2:42 PM