New York:
In response to requests from members of Congress and to at least one news report, the Federal Bureau of Investigation in New York opened a preliminary inquiry on Thursday into allegations that News Corporation journalists sought to gain access to the phone records of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, according to several people briefed on the matter.
The investigation is in its earliest stages, two of the people said, and its scope is not yet clear. It also is unclear whether the F.B.I. has identified possible targets of the investigation or possible specific criminal violations.
The bureau is "taking a hard look at it from a couple of angles," one of the people said. The person said the matter was being treated as an assessment, a term the bureau uses to characterize the early stages of an investigation that precede the possible issuance of subpoenas or the use of other investigative tools like wiretaps.
The inquiry was prompted in part by a letter from Representative Peter T. King, a Long Island Republican, to Robert S. Mueller III, the F.B.I. director, in which he asked that the bureau immediately open an investigation of News Corporation, citing news reports that journalists working for its subsidiary, The News of the World, had tried to obtain the phone records of 9/11 victims through bribery and unauthorized wiretapping, the people said.
The decision to open a case in New York stemmed from the expanding hacking scandal that has wracked Britain for days, ever since disclosures that The News of the World had illegally intercepted the voice mail of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl abducted and murdered in 2002. It also follows a decision by the News Corporation's chairman, Rupert Murdoch, to withdraw from the biggest media takeover bid in British history.
The inquiry was expected to be handled jointly by two F.B.I. squads in the bureau's New York office, one that investigates cybercrimes and another that focuses on public corruption and white-collar crimes, two of the people said. They all spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case.
It was not immediately clear whether federal prosecutors in Manhattan were involved in the case; they would most likely have jurisdiction over any prosecution because the 9/11 victims and their cellphones were in Manhattan when they died.
Ellen Davis, a spokeswoman for the United States attorney's office in Manhattan, also declined to comment.
Laura Sweeney, a Justice Department spokeswoman in Washington, said: "The department does not comment specifically on investigations, though anytime we see evidence of wrongdoing, we take appropriate action. The department has received letters from several members of Congress regarding allegations related to News Corporation, and we're reviewing those."
Jack Horner, a spokesman for the company, declined to comment.
Mr. King said in his letter on Wednesday that he was requesting the investigation not only as the chairman of the House Subcommittee on Homeland Security, but also as a congressman whose district lost more than 150 people in the 9/11 attacks. "It is my duty to discern every fact behind these allegations," he wrote.
He cited recent news reports, apparently referring to an article first published on Monday in The Daily Mirror, a chief competitor to The News of the World, which was closed down on Sunday as a result of the scandal. The article said reporters working for the newspaper had contacted a private investigator, a former New York police officer, and offered to pay him to retrieve the phone numbers of 9/11 victims and get details of the calls they had made and received in the days leading up to the attacks.
"If these allegations are proven true," Mr. King wrote, "the conduct would merit felony charges for attempting to violate various federal statutes related to corruption of public officials and prohibitions against wiretapping. Any person found guilty of this purported conduct should receive the harshest sanctions available under law."
It is not clear whether the person referred to in the Daily Mirror article was a police officer at the time of the attacks.
At least five Democratic lawmakers, who all had previously been critical of the News Corporation, spoke out about the matter this week. Mr. King was the first Republican to call for an investigation into the activities of the company, whose chief executive, Mr. Murdoch, is a longtime supporter of conservative causes and Republican politicians.
Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, Democrat of West Virginia, was the first to issue a statement on the matter, saying on Tuesday that the United States government should hold investigations to "ensure that Americans have not had their privacy violated."
On Wednesday, he was joined by the two New Jersey senators, Robert Menendez and Frank R. Lautenberg. Senator Menendez asked the Justice Department to investigate the claims involving 9/11 victims, saying in his letter that the "large scope" of the hacking in Britain made it "imperative to investigate whether victims in the United States have been affected as well."
Senator Lautenberg suggested that both the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission should examine the case and consider opening a formal investigation. He cited news reports that journalists had "paid London police officers for information, including private telephone information, about the British royal family and other individuals for use in newspaper articles."