Hack attack: Anything for the story

Tabloid hacks do not tend to be nice people, concludes Sharon Marshall in her insider's account of the popular press, Tabloid Girl, in which she recounts her experiences of working for News of the World, The Sun and other red tops.

In the newly published book, she reveals what she regards as the tricks of the trade.

There was the "dull pastel" frock and "unremarkable hat" for sneaking into weddings as an uninvited guest, usually in the guise of "a friend of the bride's 'from WeightWatchers"'.

Marshall never dressed for the "old white-coat stunt" of pretending to be a doctor, but she knew colleagues who did.

She admits trying to scale fences to steal a copy of a new book. And when she conducted interviews, she would often pretend to need a toilet break, making a show of switching off her tape recorder while she left the room but leaving a second recorder running in her handbag.

"It's a great way of getting an unexpected exclusive."

Meanwhile, Andy Coulson, the Conservative Party's director of communications, prepares to speak to Scotland Yard detectives on what he knew about the illegal hacking of mobile phones taking place at the News of the World when he was editing the paper.

Coulson had assured a parliamentary committee that he had no knowledge of the hacking being undertaken by its royal editor, Clive Goodman, and a private investigator, Glenn Mulcaire, whom the tabloid was paying £100,000 ($213,000) a year.

Goodman and Mulcaire were jailed in 2007 and Coulson resigned, while admitting nothing. Last week, the New York Times published claims by Sean Hoare, a former News of the World reporter, that Coulson "actively encouraged" him to hack phones.

The Tory spin doctor told MPs that there was no culture of phone-hacking at the newspaper. Yet Marshall writes that: "Every journalist who has ever worked on any tabloid will know exactly how to do it and which codes you use."

Matthew Wright, a former reporter on The Sun and the Daily Mirror, blames the growth of the PR industry for creating a situation where he was "beaten with sticks to come up with absolutely extraordinary and sensational stories to titillate and captivate the readers".

Wright claims that the PR industry has the cash-strapped tabloids in its pocket.

"PRs are working much more hand in glove with journalists; there doesn't seem to be anywhere near the pressure on the showbiz reporters to generate original and sensational material."

Such a state of affairs places even greater pressure on tabloid reporters who cannot play the access game with the diminishing pool of celebrities still willing to talk to the press.

At the same time, the internet and Big Brother-style television shows have transformed public notions of personal privacy.

Would Coulson's hacks - or those working for other tabloid editors - have told the truth about how they got their scoops? In a shrinking, PR-controlled and under-resourced sector, maybe not.

"They have to get the story. They have to save their job," Marshall writes. "If they don't do it, someone else in the industry will. The other person will get the story and the glory."

- INDEPENDENT