Tag Archives: INM

During Leaders’ Questions in the Dail this morning

This morning.

More details from the affidavit which the Director of Corporate Enforcement Ian Drennan has given to the High Court – in a bid to have inspectors investigate Independent News and Media (INM) – emerged.

Simon Carswell and Mark Paul, in The Irish Times, reported that on November 12, 2016, former INM chairman Leslie Buckley forwarded an email to INM’s largest shareholder Denis O’Brien which Mr Buckley had received from PR executive Nigel Heneghan.

The email from Mr Heneghan detailed a conversation the Minister for Communications Denis Naughten had with Eoghan O’Neachtain, director of public affairs at Nigel Heneghan’s PR firm the day before, November 11, 2016.

[Mr O’Neachtain took up the role at Heneghan PR in 2015 – after he served as Press Secretary to three Governments and Taoisigh]

The Irish Times has reported that Mr O’Neachtain’s conversation with Minister Naughten was about INM’s proposed takeover of the regional newspaper group, called Celtic Media Group and, in this conversation, the minister told Mr O’Neachtain that he planned to refer the proposed takeover to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland.

This discussion was then relayed to Denis O’Brien in the aforementioned email of November 12, 2016.

This was reportedly two months before the minister’s plans were made public.

Further to this…

This morning.

During Leaders’ Questions…

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar was questioned about the matter.

Sinn Fein TD Mary Lou McDonald pointed out that the email sent to Mr O’Brien “stressed that the information contained within it should be treated with the strictest of confidence”.

Ms McDonald also said that the PR company didn’t log the engagement with the minister with the Lobbying Register.

As he responded, Mr Varadkar outlined the timeline of events, as he saw them – after he told the Dail that he is satisfied that Minister Naughten didn’t disclose any information which was confidential.

Mr Varadkar also said there appeared to be a misunderstanding about the process and that “it’s not a secret process“.

From his responses:

“The minister informs me that it was the 4th of January 2017, and not November 2016. The information, as I said earlier, was not confidential. It is not unusual for PR companies and PR agents to use information that is not confidential or publicaly available and make out that somehow that it is confidential information.

“…I think deputy, almost anyone in Ireland can have access to a minister, it’s not that difficult to access politicians or ministers in Ireland, whether it’s through a constituency clinic or whether it’s simply by requesting a meeting or a phone call.”

“…In terms of timeline, I’m advised that the merge’s process went through the full rigour required of the Act and the guidelines after it was received by Minister Naughton on the 21st November, 2016.

“The recommendation was made by officials on the 4th January 2017 – that the acquisition be referred to a phase two examination and that was approved by Minister Naughten on the 10th of January.”

Further to this…

A few weeks after this reported phonecall between Mr O’Neachtain and Minister Naughten on November 11, 2016, Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy was told by Minister Naughten that he had not yet decided if he was going to refer the proposed takeover to the BAI (see above).

So.

It appears Minister Naughten told an INM representative but didn’t tell the Dail.

Deputy Murphy has said in a statement:

“The entire matter really opens up questions, yet again, regarding the axis between powerful individuals and political decisions.“

Denis Naughten will give a statement to the Dail and take questions on foot of it at 3pm.

Meanwhile…

Readers may wish to recall that Nigel Heneghan was appointed to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland in February 2015.

The position was not advertised.

At the time, the then Minister for Communications Alex White told The Sunday Times he wasn’t required to advertise the position as the compliance committee didn’t come under new rules for appointments to State boards.

In November 2016 – the same month that the alleged exchanges took place between INM representatives and the Minister for Communications Denis Naughten – Mark Tighe, in The Sunday Times, was reporting that Mr Heneghan had to excuse himself from discussions about several complaints it had dealt with because he was acting for two companies connected with Denis O’Brien.

Mr Tighe reported:

“Nigel Heneghan is a spokesman for Actavo, an O’Brien-owned construction services company formerly called Siteserv, and for Independent News & Media (INM), the newspaper publishing company in which O’Brien is the largest shareholder.

“He declared conflicts of interests in relation to five cases before the BAI compliance committee, according to its 2015 annual report.”

“…Heneghan absented himself from cases involving complaints that dealt with water charges or Irish Water. Actavo was one of three firms contracted by Irish Water to install meters. It became a focus of protests after some people were temporarily jailed for physically stopping Actavo staff working on installations.

“Two of the cases in which Heneghan declared conflicts involved Newstalk, a national radio station owned by O’Brien’s Communicorp. The other three instances involved RTE Radio shows. Heneghan did not declare conflicts in relation to other Newstalk cases that did not involve water charges.”

O’Brien told of Minister’s plan to refer INM’s Celtic Media takeover (Simon Carswell, Mark Paul, The Irish Times)

BAI member in conflict due to O’Brien link (Mark Tighe, The Sunday Times, November 20, 2016)

Transcript: Kildare Street

Video: Mick Caul

This afternoon.

In the Dáil.

During Leaders’ Questions…

Fianna Fáil’s leader Michael Martin raised the alleged data breach at Independent News and Media and matters of editorial independence and independence of journalists.

He said the recent events were a “wake-up call” for the Oireachtas to “deal with these issues”.

Mr Martin mentioned a report published last year by Mr Justice John Murray about the protection of journalistic sources, called ‘Review of the law on the retention of an access to communications data’.

Mr Martin said this report hasn’t been acted upon since it was published in April 2017 and called for a national law to be established for source protection.

Mr Martin added:

“Will you reaffirm to the house because I think something happened yesterday, whereby an actor of the State – the Director of the Office Corporate Enforcement was essentially, received correspondence that in line of his duty, he may be peronsally held liable in respect of certain things.

“I think it’s very important that the messages goes out from the Oireachtas and form Government that any actor of the State is indemnified and will not lose out personally in any way for conducting his duty on behalf of the taxpayer and on behalf of the State.

“I think it’s very important that that affirmation should be given in respect of the ODCE director today.”

Mr Varadkar said:

“Thanks very much, deputy, for raising this important question and to answer yours, I think given recent revelations, yes we are going to have to give consideration to legislation in this area to protect sources.

“I’m not aware of any legislation being drafted currently by Government and I haven’t seen any legislation drafted by Opposition, in the form of private members’ bills in the past two years but perhaps, perhaps time has certainly come for Government to dust down those reports and give consideration to legislation in this area.

“I think having an Independent News and Media is a cornerstone to our democracy, it is after all the fourth estate.

“I believe journalists must be free to pursue stories that they want to pursue. Their sources should be protected, free from any unjust interference, external or internal.

“We need to the plurality of voices in the media. We need to ensure that these voices are not drowned our or silenced and we also need diversity and ownership. So I commend journalists who work to report on this story, including journalists at Independent News and Media who haven’t allowed their independence to be compromised.

“A report of the data breach represent a significant a very significant threat to the freedom of our press, however I think that the way that the media has responded to this threat to date should reassure us that our press will not be silenced.

“Obviously, any alleged breach of personal data is a matter of concern, heather it relates to journalists or public citizens and it’s important to say that although this is now a matter before the courts, we need to respect that and bear in mind that in terms of our contributions and I know the deputy has.

“The Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement, the ODCE, which is a Government office at the Department of Business has now made an application to the high court under Section 748 of the Companiess Act 2014 to appoint inspectors to investigate the affairs of INM.

“This is now an enforcement matter for the ODCE. Section 949, subsection 3 of the Companies Act, provides that the Director of Corporate Enforcement shall be independent in the performance of its statutory functions.

“That case commenced as of yesterday.

“In terms of indemnity, it is absolutely the case that any public servant that acts properly, and acts in accordance with their mandate, and doesn’t breach any law or ethical principles is of course indemnified by the State.”

Meanwhile…

After Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald also asked questions in light of the alleged data breach at INM, Tipperary’s Independent TD Michael Lowry asked his question of the Taoiseach…

He started:

“Sorry to trouble you with more mundane and practical matters but some of you city representatives and urban centres wouldn’t recognise or realise the huge problem, the massive problem we have in relation to rural and county roads…”

Watch live here

From top: Former Sunday Independent journalist Sam Smyth (right), one of those mentioned as having his data breached while working for the INM Group; Head of News INM, Jane Last outside the High Court this afternoon

This afternoon.

The High Court.

Further to an adjournment, the copurt will hear INM’s challenge to the decision of the ODCE to apply to have inspectors appointed to the company on May 9.

The court heard Mr O’Brien has written to the Director of Corporate Enforcement, Ian Drennan, telling him he intended to hold him “fully and personally responsible” for what he alleged were “breaches of duty”.

In the letter sent on 6 April, Mr O’Brien said he had been subjected to extraordinary and intensifying media coverage suggesting he had been involved in wrongdoing.

He suggested that the Director had facilitated media access to the extensive document prepared by the ODCE in support of its application or had failed to take steps to restrict access to it.

Mr O’Brien said this was causing damage to him and to his reputation.

 

O’Brien accuses ODCE of leaking details of INM application (RTÉ)

Rollignnews

 

Reception at Independent News and Media

This afternoon.

Further to an RTE report this lunchtime about how it appears an alleged data breach at Independent News and Media may have included emails sent from an ‘external person’ to one of the so-called INM 19…..

Journalist and activist Eamonn Crudden writes:

Dear INM,

I have supplied, as an activist and journalist, over many years a variety of data to Independent News and Media. That obviously involved my consenting to INM using it in a variety of ways appropriate to a news organisation.

I have a firmly held belief – as a result of considering the totality of the information now in the public domain in the UK and Irish mainstream press around the story of the “#INM19” that this data – and my identity as the source of the data – has been conveyed to a 3rd party without my knowledge or consent and without any other lawful basis for this conveyance.

I also have a sincerely held belief that data concerning me in the form of email exchanges between Independent Newspaper Group staff – and potentially between such staff and other parties concerning me – which may be damaging to my good name – may have been conveyed in the same manner.

I believe that the processing (including storage) of that type of data by a 3rd party clearly constitutes an ongoing data breach.

I believe sincerely that the original data controller (at the time of any given example of my conveyance of data to INM) as well as INM more generally – is now answerable for this ongoing breach.

The e-mail addresses I have used as a journalist and citizen are ecrudden@hotmail.com and ecrudden@gmail.com. Only the second of the two is presently in use by me.

I have a sincerely held belief my right to privacy – as both 1) a citizen and 2) a journalist/activist – has been traduced.

Can you assist me in sourcing, identifying and reviewing any and all such data immediately so that I may be in a position to assess any potential personal consequences and consequences for those I worked with in the contexts of journalism and activism in the past?

I would also be interested to hear how INM might propose 1) to remedy the damage that has almost certainly been inflicted on my right to privacy (considering recent news reports as described above) and 2) to halt what I believe to be the ongoing nature of such a breach.

Yours,

Eamonn Crudden

So it begins.

Earlier: ‘Emails To And From INM And Also Digital Files’

Pic: Independent House

INM logo; Denis O’Brien (right) and former INM chairman Leslie Buckley

This afternoon.

Further to an alleged data breach at Independent News and Media.

It’s being reported that INM has written to individuals who may have had their data searched.

David Murphy, of RTE, has seen one of these letters.

He told Claire Byrne on RTE’s News At One earlier:

Claire Byrne: “What does it [the letter] say?”

David Murphy: “Basically Clare, what it is is INM setting out the timeline of events, what it knew, what it didn’t know and it has also outlined the new information it got from the Office of Director of Corporate Enforcement which is hoping to appoint inspectors to investigate business affairs at Independent.

“So, in a nutshell, really what it says is that the letter says to people that their data may have been searched.

“Initially the company was informed that this search was looking for a long-term service contract but now it’s been informed by the Director of Corporate Enforcement that the search may have been more extensive and for a different purpose.

“And it says that there was a list of names and or people of interest and that the individuals who’ve received the letter were on that list.”

Byrne: “This is the 19 people that we’ve heard of.”

Murphy: “This is the 19, exactly.”

“The company says it doesn’t know if any searches were undertaken or for what purpose but it says, based on the limited information currently available to INM, it seems possible that there were searches done.

“The company said it didn’t know to whom any of the searches, search results, would have been provided.

“It says, in the letter, that information related to you may have been put at risk of an unauthorised disclosure which would have consisted of emails to and from INM and also digital files held on its servers where any reference to a named individual, as of October 2014.

Byrne: “So if you’re one of the 19, if your name popped up anywhere on their system, regardless, outside of your email exchanges, they’re saying, that’s included as well.”

Murphy: “That’s included. So it’s not just emails sent by an individual in INM, it’s also emails they would have received or emails sent by an external person who’s on the list going into INM, so you can see it’s actually quite broad in terms of the way the search could have been conducted.”

Byrne: “OK, and the email [letter] aswell firmly points the finger at who they believe was responsible here?”

Murphy: “That’s right so what it says here is very clearly that the information was provided to a third party service provider under the instruction of the then chairman of INM. Now Leslie Buckley, last Friday, who was the chairman at the time, issued a statement because a lot of this material has arisen from an affidavit which is being lodged in the High Court by the head of Corporate Enforcement Ian Drennan.

“And Mr Buckley has said that he is going to defend robustly each and every allegation and he also was very disappointed by the way in which this information had come into the public domain as opposed to being raised in court where it could be perhaps challenged by someone’s legal representative.

“But today he’s saying he’s not commenting on the letter.”

Byrne: “Ok, but we will hear more about this in five days time, if not before, but in five days time, we have that court hearing.”

Murphy: “So, in five days time, the Director of Corporate Enforcement is due to go into court and outline his reasons why he thinks inspectors should be appointed into INM. With any court case, you never really know, sometimes, they’re adjourned, but that’s the date that’s in the legal diary.”

Byrne: “OK, David Murphy, thank you very much for that.”

Listen back in full here

INM confirms Buckley role in alleged data breach (RTE)

This morning.

RDS, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.

Good times.

Data commissioner still intends to speak at INM security conference (Irish Times)

Dublin Data SEC 2018

(Thanks John Roberts)

Update:

Hmm.

Yesterday

Today

CEO of Neva Labs Mark Little

Further to the alleged data breach at Independent News and Media.

And Data Commissioner Helen Dixon stating she will appear at an INM-sponsored data protection conference in Dublin’s RDS next week…despite Ms Dixon investigating INM’s alleged data breach…

The Irish Times, is reporting that Mark Little – who was scheduled to be a speaker at the event – has pulled out.

Mr Little, now chief executive of digital media company Neva Labs, said that he was due to participate as unpaid panellist at the INM conference speaking about broader issues around privacy and how people can regain control of their personal data from large corporations.

“I am not going to do this on Monday,” he told The Irish Times. “As far as I am concerned there is a conflict of interest for me as a journalist.”

Data regulator to speak at INM event despite investigation (The Irish Times)

Yesterday: At The Data Summit

From top: Yesterday’s Irish Independent; and from the Irish Independent-sponsored data security conference

Further to the alleged data breach at Independent News and Media…

And reports that the Data Protection Commissioner Helen Dixon is to investigate into the alleged breach…

And the Irish Independent-sponsored data security conference in Dublin on Monday…

Gemma O’Doherty tweetz:

I have asked @DPCIreland Helen Dixon whether she still intends to be the keynote speaker at INM’s conference on data protection next week given she is investigating an alleged data breach by the company #INM19 #INM #dataprotection

GDPR?

Dublin Data Sec 2018 

Previously: Look Hack In Anger

‘Arguably One Of The Largest Data Breaches In The History Of The State’

UDPATE:

Tom Lyons tweetz:

“So this happened in INM…”

Meanwhile…

Earlier: ‘Arguably One Of The Largest Data Breaches In The History Of The State’

Denis O’Brien

Meanwhile…

Previously: Why Did You Have These People Hacked?

Look Hack In Anger

Related: Thicker Than Uisce (January 30, 2014)

Contains Impurities (October 9, 2014)