The head of Sky News has apologised to the Leveson inquiry after the broadcaster previously said that it had not engaged in any hacking, when executives knew that a reporter had accessed emails without permission on several occasions.
John Ryley told Lord Justice Leveson on Monday that it was "very regrettable" that a lawyer representing Sky News had written to the inquiry last September stating: "Sky News editorial and reporting staff to whom we have spoken have never intercepted communications."
When the letter was sent, Ryley and other senior Sky News staff were aware that reporter Gerard Tubb had hacked into emails belonging to "canoe man" John Darwin and a woman who had killed her own children – because they had authorised the email accesses.
Hacking emails is a breach of the Computer Misuse Act 1990, to which there is no prima facie public interest defence. Intercepting somebody's communications, whether phone calls or emails, breaches the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, which again has no explicit public interest defence.
Sky News claims, however, to have been acting in the public interest in the case of Darwin.
The original Sky News submission to the Leveson inquiry added that any proposal to engage in hacking "would not be countenanced", but Ryley, giving evidence on Monday, said that the lawyer writing the letter was only thinking about phone hacking in the aftermath of the News of the World controversy.
Ryley said that the questions from the Leveson inquiry were understood to be about "telephone hacking and payments to public officials, and our response to you on 16 September, having taken external legal advice as well, was that we would focus on that particular issue, those two issues".
The head of Sky News agreed that the original testimony supplied – in response to a formal legal notice issued by Leveson – was "inaccurate", agreeing with the characterisation offered by David Barr, the counsel to the inquiry.
Tubb's email hacking, which was approved by senior Sky News executives, including Ryley, was revealed by the Guardian earlier this month. Following that report Ryley was asked to give evidence to Leveson.
Ryley also gave more detail about the decision to authorise Tubb to access email accounts belonging to Darwin and his wife Anne in June 2008, ahead of her trial for deception and money laundering.
Darwin had already pleaded guilty to seven charges of deception and a passport offence in March of that year, after faking his own death and fleeing to Panama.
Ryley said it had become clear in June 2008 that the prosecution in the Darwin case would not be accessing email accounts, but added that Tubb had not been encouraged by prosecutors to do so.
Tubb obtained permission from Sky News managing editor Simon Cole and then accessed email accounts belonging to the Darwins several times in June 2008. Ryley himself was briefed on 1 July ahead of Anne's trial.
The Sky News boss said that he thought the email hacking was reasonable at the time "because we were giving it to police … and it was reasonable to use after the trial had finished and they had been convicted".
"It was a good scoop," Ryley told the inquiry.
At one point Tubb jokes in an email about the "reward he should receive from the state" for his investigations. "There's a reference to the Queen's Police Medal," Barr said.
The inquiry also heard how Tubb's managing editor responded "bad luck, inspector" in an email when the reporter got into a Darwin account and found all the emails have been wiped.
Ryley said that Cleveland police received information from the Darwin emails via Tubb, and then used the passwords the Sky News reporter had obtained to examine the emails themselves.
Leveson asked whether the trial judge was aware of how the emails had been obtained by Sky News, and whether the police obtained a warrant to examine them, but Ryley said on each occasion that he could not answer.
Earlier, when pressed by Leveson, Ryley indicated that it was "highly unlikely" that Sky News would engage in hacking again. Leveson asked Ryley where in Ofcom's broadcasting code it gave Sky News "any authority for a breach of the criminal law".
It emerged on Monday that Ofcom is investigating whether Sky News breached its broadcasting code by hacking Darwin's emails.
Sky News also gave first details to the Leveson inquiry on Monday of a decision to hack into a second account — the email of the partner of suspected peadophile Martin Smith, who was on the run in Spain.
The case became headline news after Lianne Smith smothered her two children to death following his arrest.
Ryley explained that Tubb believed from his investigations that there had been failings by the authorities to follow up on the care of the daughter, Rebecca, who had already been placed under protection proceedings.
By hacking into her email, Sky News was trying to establish if the mother, who was a childcare worker, had been in touch with the authorities at home.
Tubb discovered that she had set up a nursery in Barcelona called Early Performers and on 23 May 2010 emailed his boss, Simon Cole, to ask permission to hack into her email.
"The security question she protected her account with is her favourite film. Should I try and guess it?" Tubb said in his email.
Just over an hour later, Cole responds from his phone: "Yes please Gerard. Legitimate public interest. Good Hunting."
The inquiry heard that Sky News did not find sufficient information that the local authority had failed in following up on the care of the daughter.
• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".
• To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook.
