Nick Davies's Blog, page 11

NSA targeted Dmitry Medvedev at London G20 summit

Leaked documents reveal Russian president was spied on during visit, as questions are raised over use of US base in Britain

American spies based in the UK intercepted the top-secret communications of the then Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, during his visit to Britain for the G20 summit in London, leaked documents reveal.

The details of the intercept were set out in a briefing prepared by the National Security Agency (NSA), America's biggest surveillance and eavesdropping organisation, and shared with high-ranking officials from Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

The document, leaked by the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and seen by the Guardian, shows the agency believed it might have discovered "a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted".

The disclosure underlines the importance of the US spy hub at RAF Menwith Hill in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, where hundreds of NSA analysts are based, working alongside liaison officers from GCHQ.

The document was drafted in August 2009, four months after the visit by Medvedev, who joined other world leaders in London, including the US president, Barack Obama, for the event hosted by the British prime minister, Gordon Brown.

Medvedev arrived in London on Wednesday 1 April and the NSA intercepted communications from his delegation the same day, according to the NSA paper, entitled: "Russian Leadership Communications in support of President Dmitry Medvedev at the G20 summit in London – Intercept at Menwith Hill station."

The document starts with two pictures of Medvedev smiling for the world's media alongside Brown and Obama in bilateral discussions before the main summit.

The report says: "This is an analysis of signal activity in support of President Dmitry Medvedev's visit to London. The report details a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted. The signal activity was found to be emanating from the Russian embassy in London and the communications are believed to be in support of the Russian president."

The NSA interception of the Russian leadership at G20 came hours after Obama and Medvedev had met for the first time. Relations between the two leaders had been smoothed in the runup to the summit with a series of phone calls and letters, with both men wanting to establish a trusting relationship to discuss the ongoing banking crisis and nuclear disarmament.

In the aftermath of their discussions on 1 April, the two men issued a joint communique saying they intended to "move further along the path of reducing and limiting strategic offensive arms in accordance with the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons".

A White House official who briefed journalists described the meeting as "a very successful first meeting focused on real issues". The official said it had been important for the men to be open about the issues on which they agreed and disagreed. Obama had stressed the need to be candid, the official noted.

While it has been widely known the two countries spy on each other, it is rare for either to be caught in the act; the latest disclosures will also be deeply embarrassing for the White House as Obama prepares to meet Vladimir Putin, who succeeded Medvedev as president, in the margins of the G8 summit this week.

The two countries have long complained about the extent of each other's espionage activities, and tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats are common. A year after Obama met Medvedev, the US claimed it had broken a highly sophisticated spy ring that carried out "deep cover" assignments in the US.

Ten alleged Russian spies living in America were arrested.

Putin was withering of the FBI-led operation: "I see that your police have let themselves go and put some people in jail, but I guess that is their job. I hope the positive trend that we have seen develop in our bilateral relations recently will not be harmed by these events." Last month, the Russians arrested an American in Moscow who they alleged was a CIA agent.

The new revelations underline the significance of RAF Menwith Hill and raise questions about its relationship to the British intelligence agencies, and who is responsible for overseeing it. The 560-acre site was leased to the Americans in 1954 and the NSA has had a large presence there since 1966.

It has often been described as the biggest surveillance and interception facility in the world, and has 33 distinct white "radomes" that house satellite dishes. A US base in all but name, it has British intelligence analysts seconded to work alongside NSA colleagues, though it is unclear how the two agencies obtain and share intelligence – and under whose legal authority they are working under.

Dmitry MedvedevSurveillanceRussiaUS foreign policyUnited StatesG20Ewen MacAskillNick DaviesNick HopkinsJulian BorgerJames Ball
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GCHQ intercepted foreign politicians' communications at G20 summits

Exclusive: phones were monitored and fake internet cafes set up to gather information from allies in London in 2009

Foreign politicians and officials who took part in two G20 summit meetings in London in 2009 had their computers monitored and their phone calls intercepted on the instructions of their British government hosts, according to documents seen by the Guardian. Some delegates were tricked into using internet cafes which had been set up by British intelligence agencies to read their email traffic.

The revelation comes as Britain prepares to host another summit on Monday – for the G8 nations, all of whom attended the 2009 meetings which were the object of the systematic spying. It is likely to lead to some tension among visiting delegates who will want the prime minister to explain whether they were targets in 2009 and whether the exercise is to be repeated this week.

The disclosure raises new questions about the boundaries of surveillance by GCHQ and its American sister organisation, the National Security Agency, whose access to phone records and internet data has been defended as necessary in the fight against terrorism and serious crime. The G20 spying appears to have been organised for the more mundane purpose of securing an advantage in meetings. Named targets include long-standing allies such as South Africa and Turkey.

There have often been rumours of this kind of espionage at international conferences, but it is highly unusual for hard evidence to confirm it and spell out the detail. The evidence is contained in documents – classified as top secret – which were uncovered by the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and seen by the Guardian. They reveal that during G20 meetings in April and September 2009 GCHQ used what one document calls "ground-breaking intelligence capabilities" to intercept the communications of visiting delegations.

This included:

• Setting up internet cafes where they used an email interception programme and key-logging software to spy on delegates' use of computers;

• Penetrating the security on delegates' BlackBerrys to monitor their email messages and phone calls;

• Supplying 45 analysts with a live round-the-clock summary of who was phoning who at the summit;

• Targeting the Turkish finance minister and possibly 15 others in his party;

• Receiving reports from an NSA attempt to eavesdrop on the Russian leader, Dmitry Medvedev, as his phone calls passed through satellite links to Moscow.

The documents suggest that the operation was sanctioned in principle at a senior level in the government of the then prime minister, Gordon Brown, and that intelligence, including briefings for visiting delegates, was passed to British ministers.

A briefing paper dated 20 January 2009 records advice given by GCHQ officials to their director, Sir Iain Lobban, who was planning to meet the then foreign secretary, David Miliband. The officials summarised Brown's aims for the meeting of G20 heads of state due to begin on 2 April, which was attempting to deal with the economic aftermath of the 2008 banking crisis. The briefing paper added: "The GCHQ intent is to ensure that intelligence relevant to HMG's desired outcomes for its presidency of the G20 reaches customers at the right time and in a form which allows them to make full use of it." Two documents explicitly refer to the intelligence product being passed to "ministers".

According to the material seen by the Guardian, GCHQ generated this product by attacking both the computers and the telephones of delegates.

One document refers to a tactic which was "used a lot in recent UK conference, eg G20". The tactic, which is identified by an internal codeword which the Guardian is not revealing, is defined in an internal glossary as "active collection against an email account that acquires mail messages without removing them from the remote server". A PowerPoint slide explains that this means "reading people's email before/as they do".

The same document also refers to GCHQ, MI6 and others setting up internet cafes which "were able to extract key logging info, providing creds for delegates, meaning we have sustained intelligence options against them even after conference has finished". This appears to be a reference to acquiring delegates' online login details.

Another document summarises a sustained campaign to penetrate South African computers, recording that they gained access to the network of their foreign ministry, "investigated phone lines used by High Commission in London" and "retrieved documents including briefings for South African delegates to G20 and G8 meetings". (South Africa is a member of the G20 group and has observer status at G8 meetings.)

A detailed report records the efforts of the NSA's intercept specialists at Menwith Hill in North Yorkshire to target and decode encrypted phone calls from London to Moscow which were made by the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, and other Russian delegates.

Other documents record apparently successful efforts to penetrate the security of BlackBerry smartphones: "New converged events capabilities against BlackBerry provided advance copies of G20 briefings to ministers … Diplomatic targets from all nations have an MO of using smartphones. Exploited this use at the G20 meetings last year."

The operation appears to have run for at least six months. One document records that in March 2009 – the month before the heads of state meeting – GCHQ was working on an official requirement to "deliver a live dynamically updating graph of telephony call records for target G20 delegates … and continuing until G20 (2 April)."

Another document records that when G20 finance ministers met in London in September, GCHQ again took advantage of the occasion to spy on delegates, identifying the Turkish finance minister, Mehmet Simsek, as a target and listing 15 other junior ministers and officials in his delegation as "possible targets". As with the other G20 spying, there is no suggestion that Simsek and his party were involved in any kind of criminal offence. The document explicitly records a political objective – "to establish Turkey's position on agreements from the April London summit" and their "willingness (or not) to co-operate with the rest of the G20 nations".

The September meeting of finance ministers was also the subject of a new technique to provide a live report on any telephone call made by delegates and to display all of the activity on a graphic which was projected on to the 15-sq-metre video wall of GCHQ's operations centre as well as on to the screens of 45 specialist analysts who were monitoring the delegates.

"For the first time, analysts had a live picture of who was talking to who that updated constantly and automatically," according to an internal review.

A second review implies that the analysts' findings were being relayed rapidly to British representatives in the G20 meetings, a negotiating advantage of which their allies and opposite numbers may not have been aware: "In a live situation such as this, intelligence received may be used to influence events on the ground taking place just minutes or hours later. This means that it is not sufficient to mine call records afterwards – real-time tip-off is essential."

In the week after the September meeting, a group of analysts sent an internal message to the GCHQ section which had organised this live monitoring: "Thank you very much for getting the application ready for the G20 finance meeting last weekend … The call records activity pilot was very successful and was well received as a current indicator of delegate activity …

"It proved useful to note which nation delegation was active during the moments before, during and after the summit. All in all, a very successful weekend with the delegation telephony plot."

GCHQSurveillanceEspionageG20Gordon BrownEwen MacAskillNick DaviesNick HopkinsJulian BorgerJames Ball
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Sun faces first civil claim as model sues over 'police bribes'

Model Sarah Hannon is suing the Sun and Scotland Yard for misuse of private information in story involving former boyfriend

A model is suing the Sun and Scotland Yard in the first civil claim linked to alleged corrupt payments to police officers and public officials.

Sarah Hannon is claiming damages at the high court for misuse of private information by the Metropolitan police and the Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid.

She appeared in a Sun story in June 2010 that claimed her then-boyfriend was arrested after allegedly engaging in a sex act with another woman on a flight from Heathrow to Bangalore.

Her claim is the first linked to alleged payments to police officers, potentially opening a new front in Scotland Yard's Operation Elveden inquiry which has led to the arrests of about 65 journalists, police officers or public officials since 2011.

Other individuals, including the Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood and the mother of England footballer John Terry, are among those whose details have been leaked to the Sun.

The legal action will be a fresh headache for the Sun's publisher, News International, which is attempting to settle civil claims brought by alleged victims of phone hacking by the News of the World.

The newspaper group has paid damages to 261 claimants to date, but others, including the Notting Hill actor Rhys Ifans, have not yet been settled. Those claimants brought cases at the high court after the Metropolitan police began contacting dozens of alleged phone-hacking victims when it launched in January 2011.

To date, six Sun journalists have been charged under the Operation Elveden investigation along with a number of other former police officers and public officials.

Clodagh Hartley, the Sun's Whitehall editor, is to appear at Westminster magistrates court on Wednesday on charges of conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office in relation to alleged payments to Jonathan Hall, a press officer at Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, and his partner, Marta Bukarewicz for stories.

The Crown Prosecution Service said the Sun is alleged to have paid £17,475 to the pair between 30 March 2008 and 15 July 2011 for information, including unannounced details of the 2010 budget and the government's deficit reduction plans.

Scotland Yard and News International had not returned a request for comment at the time of publication.

The SunMetropolitan policeNewspapers & magazinesNational newspapersNews InternationalNewspapersNick DaviesJosh Halliday
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Kidnapping of Ronnie Biggs ends in farce: From Guardian archive, 25 Mar 1981

Fugitive was unsuccessfully abducted in Rio by gang who were due a reward

The strange saga of the abduction of Ronald Biggs lurched from hoax to farce yesterday as his kidnappers lost control of their yacht off the coast of Barbados and Biggs himself tried desperately to prove that he really is one of Britain's most wanted men.

Scotland Yard last night flew out copies of Biggs's fingerprints so that the Barbados authorities can confirm his identity. If the result is positive, the Director of Public Prosecutions is expected to begin extradition proceedings.

The Deputy Commissioner of Police in Barbados, Mr Orville Durant, said that his prisoner wanted to be returned to Brazil, where his seven-year-old son Mikey has been told by friends that his father is in a neighbouring town for a photographic session.

"He has told us he is not interested in being returned to Britain," said Mr Durant.

Two of the alleged kidnappers were also held by the Barbados police, as more details of their plot emerged. The original theory held by the Brazilian police that the abduction was a hoax to publicise Biggs's new book receded.

It is now clear that three of the men involved were also concerned in an escapade in 1979 when, according to Biggs, they arrived in Rio, introduced themselves as British ex-soldiers, made friends and tried to persuade him to fly with them to a film location where, Biggs believes, he would have been abducted.

All three claim to be former members of the SAS. The three are John Miller, also known as McKillip, Fred Prime, and Norman Boyle. All live in London, where they work as bodyguards.

At the time the yacht carrying Biggs arrived in Barbadian waters Mr Miller was entertaining guests at his wedding reception on the island.

Mr Miller, aged 36, is due to appear at Marlborough Street Court in London today to face an assault charge arising out of a fight at a West End night club. He has been on bail since December 6.

When asked the reason for the kidnap, Mr Miller told an ITV interviewer in Barbados last night: "It was to bring him into the country which would then be sympathetic to Britain's pleas for extradition. There has been no intention to harm him."

He denied seeking money from newspapers for the story. "We have been paid already. All I want is to get my guys out of this Barbadian jail and get them home."

Biggs was taken from a restaurant in Rio on March 16. An associate of the kidnappers, Mr Gerry Brown, said yesterday: "Biggs was taken against his will, but once on the yacht he cooperated because he became resigned to what was happening.

"Mace gas was used at the Rio end and he may have been bruised. In the van they zipped him up in a canvas bag with four carrying handles to take to an aircraft waiting outside Rio. There were booze and cigarettes available to him on the boat."

It is believed that Mr Biggs was flown from Rio to the northern harbour of Belem at the mouth of the Amazon, from where he was taken by yacht to the Caribbean. But about 15 miles east of Barbados the yacht's generator failed and the crew put out an SOS.

In London, former Detective Chief Superintendent Jack Slipper, who arrested Biggs in Brazil in 1974 only to be frustrated by extradition difficulties, spoke up for Biggs: "I am disappointed for him," he said. "I would have liked to have seen him come back to Britain under his own steam.

"But if he is brought back, I would like to see careful consideration given by the Parole Board over terms of release from prison. Biggs is not a violent man. He was an also-ran in the train robber team, not one of the top men and never in the same division."

[Barbados rejected an extradition request from Britain and Biggs was returned to Brazil. He returned to the UK in 2001 and was released from prison in 2009 on compassionate grounds.]

Ronnie BiggsCrimePoliceBarbadosBrazilNick Davies
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Bomb blast at ANC London office: From the archive, 15 March 1982

African National Congress supporters suspect 'dirty tricks' by South African security forces. Suspicion also falls on British far-right groups

The London offices of the African National Congress were wrecked by a 10-pound bomb which exploded against the rear wall at nine o'clock yesterday morning. Windows up to 400 yards away were shattered.

Mr Vernet Mbatha, an ANC voluntary worker, who was sleeping in a flat above the offices was slightly injured. The explosion provoked accusations of South African "dirty tricks," and reports of plots involving rightwing groups and disgruntled former Rhodesian servicemen in London.

Police kept the area cordoned off for much of the day after reports that there might be a second device in the offices, in Penton Street, Islington. A police helicopter circled overhead while sniffer dogs were led through the debris. Nothing was found.

The ANC is banned in South Africa, where it has been stepping up its military fight against the regime. Anti-apartheid activists in London yesterday blamed the South Africans.

Mr Mike Terry, secretary of the Anti-Apartheid Movement. said: "Either directly or indirectly the finger must point to South Africa. We hope this will outrage people in this country and bring home the message that nobody can escape from what is happening in South Africa."

Mr Sam Ramsamy, of the South African non-Racial Olympic Committee, which has organised sports boycotts of South Africa, said : "We always anticipate something like this from their dirty tricksters over here. I don't think right-wingers are responsible for this."

But the Borough of Islington has been a focus for Right-wing para-military groups in the last year. The National Front's local paper published a "hit list" of 16 local organisations, one of which was subsequently fire-bombed.

The Islington Law Centre received a threatening letter from a group calling itself the New English Clan for White Rights. It spoke of mugging and rioting and said the recipient's days were numbered, as were his family's. "You will soon find out what white revenge is all about."

In the 1960s, London was be headquarters of the ANC as exiled nationalists fled to Britain. Recently, it has been centred in sympathetic southern African states, and the London office has been devoted to spreading ANC information through Western Europe.

[Nine former South African security policemen admitted to the attack
at an amnesty hearing of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission held in Pretoria]

ANC (African National Congress)South AfricaUK security and terrorismCrimeLondonThe far rightNick Davies
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Russian spy satellite tumbles to Earth: from the Guardian archive, 24 Jan 1983

By the time the satellite hit the sea it was believed to have disintegrated. The real hazard, however, lies further ahead

Cosmos 1402, the Russian spy satellite which has been out of control for more than a month, finally tumbled into the Indian Ocean last night, ending a day of anxiety for governments around the world.

The main body of the maverick satellite, weighing some 3,000lb splashed into the sea about 900 nautical miles south-east of the British dependency of Diego Garcia at 22.21 GMT - one minute ahead of the final Pentagon prediction.

By the time the satellite hit the sea it was believed to have disintegrated. The real hazard, however, lies further ahead. The satellite's nuclear core is still in orbit and is expected to decay and fall to earth during the first weeks of February.

It is feared that the platform of uranium 235 may come down in lumps of radioactive debris covering a fairly wide area - as the nuclear reactor of Cosmos 954 did over northern Canada in 1979.

Nations have been preparing for months in case the platform has not fully disintegrated by the time it reaches earth's atmosphere.

The Russians are known to have changed the design of their satellites since the crash of 954 and have persistently claimed that 1402 presents no abnormal hazard.

The satellite was visible over much of Britain last night as it fell towards earth.

Mr Max White, who spent the day monitoring the satellite from the Royal Observatory at Herstmonceux, Sussex, said that Cosmos 1402 appeared over Britain at 5.24 pm. It was visible for about a minute as it crossed Britain on a path from the south-west to the north-east, at a height of 95.6 miles.

"It was like a bright, fast-moving star," said Mr White. "We saw no burning-up occurring."

The satellite passed over the northern coast of Scotland shortly before 7pm and was expected to appear over the same area three more times as it spiralled down to earth.

Oman yesterday declared a full state of alert against a possible shower of debris from the spacecraft. The Gulf News Agency said the alert would last up to 14.00 GMT today.

In Kuwait, the Government said it had asked the Soviet Union for information on where the satellite might come down.

The United Arab Emirates placed all naval, air force and army units on alert. Russia was expected to send ships and reconnaissance jets from South Yemen, where they maintain a military presence.

Sri Lanka police shooed away sightseers from a coconut plantation where an unidentified object hurtled to the ground late on Saturday. The object was spotted by two schoolboys who said it looked like a "ball of fire."

The Canadians, mindful of the chunks of nuclear-powered Soviet satellite Cosmos 954 which fell into the remote north-west territories in January, 1978, put a 50-member rapid response team of scientists and technicians on the alert.

They were ready to track down any radioactive debris using a gamma-ray spectrometer, the equipment which played a key role in providing the first positive fix of the Cosmos 954.

Sweden's nuclear emergency surveillance team kept 1,000 people and 20 aircraft on standby. France called up 22 mobile civil defence units, supplemented by 400 teams of firemen and policemen equipped with radioactivity detectors. West Germany mobilised helicopters and ground vehicles to help to clear up any contamination.

SpaceSatellitesOceansRussiaNick DaviesAnthony Tucker
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British girl shot dead in Jamaica was 'accidental victim of feud'

Imani Green, 8, was on holiday with family when she was hit in the head by a bullet while playing in a shop

An eight-year-old British girl who was shot dead while visiting relatives in a quiet Jamaican town is thought to have been the accidental victim of a violent local feud.

Imani Green, from Balham, south London, was playing with her cousins in a shop in the north coast town of Duncans on Friday night when a gunman burst in and opened fire.

Imani was hit twice – once in the head – and died on the way to hospital. Three people injured in the shooting were also taken to hospital and are thought to be in a stable condition.

Witnesses said an unfamiliar car had pulled up near the general store at about 8.30pm. Seconds later, a masked man walked up to the shop and began shooting. One of Imani's cousins, a teenage girl who did not want to give her name for fear of reprisals, said she had tried to grab her as soon as she realised what was going on.

"A car looked like it was reversing and a guy came and walked in," she said. "When I looked the man just come round and shoot at the place."

Despite a shot tearing past her face, the girl did her best to help Imani. "I looked and realised my little cousin was sat down right here," she said, pointing to the shop's freezer cabinet. "I grabbed her and she'd been shot in the head and she just dropped down." Her cousin's body, she said, had already gone limp.

Imani's sister, Jamila Palmer, who was nearby, told the BBC: "We heard gunshots. We ran outside and shouted 'Imani! Imani! Imani!'

"I picked her up off the ground and realised she was still breathing. I flagged down a car and they drove us to hospital. The rest is history."

Imani's mother, Donna, is understood to have left her daughter to play with her cousins at the store while she went shopping in the nearby town of Falmouth. She had been due to pick her up on her return, but let Imani play on because she was enjoying spending time with her family.

On Sunday the raw-board shack still bore the scars of the shooting. Among the dominoes, the imported washing powder, packets of biscuits and the bags of corn puffs, at least four bullet holes could be seen: one in the wooden counter; one in the back wall; one in a tin of paint, and one, oddly, behind the fridge – the result, perhaps, of a ricocheting round.

Jamaican police said there were a number of lines of inquiry but they were considering the theory that the shooting was retaliation for an earlier gun attack.

They also said Imani had not been the intended target, and stressed there was no suggestion her family was involved in gang violence.

Imani's cousin, Michael Brady, said the family was struggling to come to terms with what had happened. "We really feel it," he said. "Right now I can't work. I can't go out. I just cry. I just wake up and cry."

Imani, who had sickle cell anaemia and had gone to Jamaica with the blessing of her school in the hope that the warm climate would ease her condition, had been on the island since 27 December and was due to return to London later this month.

Her brother Dean Palmer said the family had been devastated by the death of his sister, whom he described as "an extremely brave girl".

He said Imani went to Jamaica twice a year to help her cope with the disease, adding that although the family had been unsure about taking her this time, she was "back to her normal self" within a few days of arriving on the island.

Anne Wilson, the headteacher of Fircroft primary school in Tooting, where Imani was a pupil, said she was a "happy, playful child" who was popular with staff and children alike.

"She dealt with her illness very bravely and coped well with the special arrangements we had to have in place to support her," Wilson told the BBC.

"She had been given special permission to travel to Jamaica so she could benefit from the warmer climate and we had been in contact with the local primary school she was attending."

Neighbours in south London yesterday spoke of their sorrow at learning that Imani had been killed. One friend of the family, who asked not to be named, said: "This is a closeknit community, so this is going to hurt us."

Another added: "Nobody wants to speak, she was just a little girl. This is all so sad. We're distraught." Neighbours said members of Imani's family had left their home early on Sunday morning to fly to Jamaica to be with her mother.

Sadiq Khan, the shadow justice minister and MP for Tooting, said: "I am devastated to hear the news of eight-year-old schoolgirl Imani Green, a pupil at a Tooting primary school. This is terrible news."

The Foreign Office confirmed the death of a British national in Jamaica on Friday 11 January, and said it was providing consular assistance to the family, while the British honorary consul in Montego Bay described Imani's death as "a desperately sad event", adding that the consulate was doing what it could to help her relatives.

Jamaica's national security minister, Peter Bunting, told the Jamaica Gleaner: "The senseless killing of a young, innocent child must outrage all well-thinking Jamaicans, and cause us to join our security forces in an intensified effort to rid our communities of criminals."

JamaicaAmericasCrimeNick DaviesSam Jones
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Leveson report: a nightmare – but only for the old guard of Fleet Street

Coverage about 'imposing a government leash on papers' has proved to be no more than froth on the lips of propagandists

Let us look first at the nightmares that have not become real.

The government is not being invited to take over the press. All those full-page advertisements linking Lord Justice Leveson to Robert Mugabe and Bashar Assad, all that high-octane coverage in the Sun and the Mail about his report "imposing a government leash on papers" and threatening "state regulation of Britain's free press" has proved to be no more than froth on the lips of propagandists, simply another round of the same old distortion that did so much to create this inquiry in the first place.

Nor does the Leveson report accept that Fleet Street should be rewarded for its repeated abuse of power with the grant of even more power, not only to run its own regulator but to investigate journalists and to impose fines on those it might find wanting. This was the cutting edge of the plan hatched by the conservative end of Fleet Street, still blandly, blindly confident that the rest of us would accept placemen for the Express proprietor Richard Desmond ("Ethical? I don't quite know what the word means") policing the ethics of the press; or Paul Dacre (who originally told the Press Complaints Commission that the Guardian's coverage of the phone-hacking scandal was "highly exaggerated and imaginative") having some role in fining the Guardian; or executives from Rupert Murdoch's News International, which misled the press, public and parliament, being granted any kind of role in investigating the truth of other newspapers' stories. Leveson rejected this plan with a neat soundbite: "It's still the industry marking its own homework."

Nor is this any kind of catastrophe for British journalism. From a reporter's point of view, there is no obvious problem with the core of Leveson's report, his system of "independent self-regulation".

This would have three functions. First, it would handle complaints, but it would do so through an organisation that was neither appointed by nor answerable to Fleet Street. The dark end of the industry may complain that this is all a terrible threat to the free press, echoing the rapist who claims the police are a threat to free love. Why should we fear an independent referee? Why should we not be ashamed of the old Press Complaints Commission which, as the report puts it, "has failed … is not actually a regulator at all … lacks independence … has proved itself to be aligned with the interests of the press"? It is hard to think of any other decent answer to the evidence of Kate and Gerry McCann, falsely accused of murdering their own child; or of Christopher Jefferies, viciously smeared as a killer; or of any of the other witnesses in the opening module of Leveson's inquiry.

Second, the new regulator would investigate systemic offending. That looks weaker. This is not about investigating crime. There is not (nor should there be) any suggestion that the regulator would have any power to compel the disclosure of documents or to search a reporter's desk. This is about investigating systemic breaches of the code of conduct – taking pictures in breach of their subject's privacy, for example, or interviewing children without the consent of their parents. Without police powers, the regulator would rely on journalists to co-operate. History suggests they will be reluctant to do so for fear of losing their career. Numerous former News of the World journalists helped the Guardian to uncover the hacking scandal, but only two of them felt able to speak on the record. Weak, but not a threat.

Finally, and most importantly, the regulator would run a new arbitration system as a cheaper and quicker alternative to the civil courts.

That looks like very good news for reporters who currently work with laws on defamation, privacy and confidentiality that really do inhibit the freedom of the press, threatening damages and legal costs on such a scale as to encourage the suppression of the truth. The likes of Jimmy Savile do well in those conditions. Leveson's arbitration system would lighten the load. And, in addition, it offers an incentive for news organisations to volunteer to join a new regulator: their membership, Leveson suggests, would exempt them from the worst of the costs and damages they might face in the event that they do end up being sued in the civil courts. Leveson needs a new law to ensure that the courts recognise the new regulator and deliver those benefits to its members.

There is a nightmare here, but it is for the old guard of Fleet Street. To lose control of the regulator is to lose their licence to do exactly as they please.

While the political attention may focus on Leveson's plans for the future, the real power of his report is in the detailed, damning evidence of just what that licence has allowed. "Parts of the press have acted as if its own code simply did not exist … there has been a recklessness in prioritising sensational stories, almost irrespective of the harm that the stories may cause … a willingness to deploy covert surveillance against or in spite of the public interest … significant and reckless disregard for accuracy … some newspapers resorting to high volume, extremely personal attacks on those who challenge them."

The report takes on the Daily Mail and its editor, Paul Dacre, for accusing Hugh Grant of "mendacious smears" in giving his evidence to the inquiry, finding that the paper "went too far" and that Dacre "acted precipitately" and that his explanation for his actions "does not justify the aggressive line which was adopted". It tackles the Sun over its decision to expose the fact that Gordon Brown's infant son had been diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, finds that "there was no public interest in the story sufficient to justify publication without the consent of Mr and Mrs Brown", recognises the possibility that the information may have been obtained "by unlawful or unethical means" and challenges claims by the then editor Rebekah Brooks that the Browns were "absolutely committed to making this public". It details the behaviour of the Mail, Sun and Telegraph who, while Leveson was sitting, opted to publish material about the death in a coach crash in Switzerland of the 12-year-old schoolboy Sebastian Bowles, which "undeniably raises issues under the editors' code".

This does not mean that the report presents no problems for journalism generally.

In the small print, it seems to suggest that police officers should no longer be able to give non-attributable briefings to reporters. If that rule had been in place over the last few years, it is fair to say that the Guardian might not have been able to expose the hacking scandal. There is a section which implies that reporters should be able to conceal the identities of confidential sources only if they have some kind of proof of the undertaking, such as a written agreement with the source – hardly possible if your source is a professional criminal describing alleged police corruption, or a child prostitute talking about her pimp.

But the real problem, of course, is in the power of the beast. This debate is not about to be settled with facts and reasoned argument. It will be conducted under the same old rules – of falsehood, distortion and bullying. Will any government stand up to it? That's where the real nightmare may lie.

Leveson inquiryPrivacy & the mediaPress intrusionNewspapers & magazinesLord Justice LevesonPress freedomNewspapersDavid CameronNick Davies
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Nick Davies on what the Leveson report means for press regulation - video

The Guardian's Nick Davies, whose reporting on phone hacking led to David Cameron setting up the Leveson inquiry, gives his immediate reaction to the report

Nick Davies

From the archive, 24 September 1982: Buckingham Palace intruder cleared of burglary

Michael Fagan, who broke into Buckingham Palace twice, is acquitted of burglary at the Old Bailey

An Old Bailey jury heard yesterday how unemployed decorator Michael Fagan broke into Buckingham Palace, frightened a Royal chambermaid, and then spent an hour "looking at the art" before leaving undetected.

It was only when he was arrested in the Queen's private suite four weeks later that he was brought to book for that first visit. He denied burgling Buckingham Palace and stealing a quantity of wine.

When yesterday's trial opened, Mr Fagan sat in the dock smiling at his weeping mother and sisters. He removed his false teeth, winked at two teenage girls in the gallery and at one point broke into a long groan before bursting into tears. The Recorder, Mr James Miskin QC, told him to be quiet.

The Crown presented a detailed picture of the events of the night of June 7, which began at about 11.30, when Mr Fagan climbed over the palace fence and shinned up a drain-pipe to a flat roof. He was bare-footed, unshaven, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt.

"I wanted to see the Queen," he is said to have told police later. "I want to know who I am, but only she knows and can tell me. I have told my sister I am in love with Elizabeth Regina."

He made his way via another drain-pipe to the third-floor window of room 151, where one of the royal housemaids, Sarah Carter, was sitting reading. She ran from the room and found two other maids. Fagan walked through Miss Carter's room and into the corridor.

He told the court: "I walked straight in. I was surprised I wasn't captured straight away. I could have been a rapist or something. I knew I could break the security system because it was so weak."

Mr Fagan said he followed the pictures down the corridor and passed a room with Mark Phillips's name on the door. "I gathered it was probably their bedroom, so I decided not to disturb them and carried on."

He found his way to room 108, where the public's gifts for the baby expected by the Princess of Wales were being stored, shuffled through some papers, found a bottle of wine in the cabinet and sat down to have a drink.

On the other side of the palace the three chambermaids raised the alarm. Sergeant Jeffrey Braithwaite walked back to Miss Carter's room with them. He decided to organise a search.

By now Mr Fagan had drunk half the bottle of wine. "I was waiting to be captured," he told the court. "I drank it because I was waiting for someone to come."

He decided to leave. "I couldn't find anyone," he told police later, "so I thought, 'Sod it' and I went out and went home."

Four weeks later Mr Fagan returned to the palace, using the same drain-pipe to reach the roof and then getting in to the building through a different window. It was seven o'clock on the morning of July 9. He had drunk about 10 glasses of whisky.

In a statement the Queen's footman, Mr Paul Wybrew, said that at about 7.15 he had walked past the pantry and seen the Queen's personal chambermaid standing by the sink with a man he did not recognise.

The man kept saying he wanted to talk to the Queen. The footman told him, "All right, but let her get dressed first." When the man insisted that it was urgent the footman had stood in his way to stop him leaving.

Mr Wybrew said: "The man seemed very tense and I said: 'Would you like a drink?' Immediately he became more affable and replied: 'Yes please, I'll have a scotch.'"

A few minutes later, PC Robert Roberts arrived to find Mr Fagan sitting on the sideboard, swinging his feet and drinking a whisky.

Summing up, the Recorder told the jury: "You must be sure that he entered Buckingham Palace as a trespasser. You need not waste more than three seconds on that.

"He did take the wine away," said the judge. "He took it out of the cupboard where its owner had left it and then poured it down his throat so it could not be used again. So you won't have any difficulty about appropriation."

The final point was to decide whether the defendant had acted dishonestly. Sending the jury out, Judge Miskin said it would probably take them only 10 minutes to reach a decision. Fourteen minutes later they returned to announce that they had unanimously acquitted Mr Fagan of burglary.

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