9/11 phone hacking report to be probed

Attorney General Eric Holder on Wednesday promised 9/11 families a preliminary criminal investigation into a report of possible phone hacking involving the Rupert Murdoch media empire.

Following a meeting at the Justice Department that lasted more than an hour, the family members and their lawyer said they were pleased that the attorney general made the commitment for a preliminary probe into whether the Sept. 11 victims or their families were the targets of phone hacking by journalists at Murdoch's now-shuttered News of the World.

The lawyer for the families, Norman Siegel, said that the attorney general had used the words "very disturbing" to describe the possibility that phones of 9/11 victims and their family members might have been hacked.

Siegel said he and the families recommended that the Justice Department get the cell phone numbers of 9/11 victims and family members, then have the phone company search their records to find out whether someone engaged in hacking.

The families also recommended that the scope of the investigation be expanded to computers. The families also recommended a review of newspaper, TV and radio stories about 9/11 victims and their families to determine whether personal information in the stories only could have come from someone engaged in hacking.