Publisher settles 37 claims of phone hacking against it

News Group Newspapers made payouts totalling more than £640,000 to settle civil damages claims brought by 18 of the 37 individuals, the High Court heard on Thursday, according to the Press Gazette.

Actor Jude Law, his former wife Sadie Frost, rugby player Gavin Henson and Lord Prescott, the former deputy prime minister, were among those to settle claims against the paper, the Press Gazette report said.

Law received £130,000 to settle claims that his phone had been hacked into, the report said. Designer Frost received £50,000, whilst both Henson and Lord Prescott received £40,000 each to settle the claims they made, it said. Other settlements were agreed with figures including Ulrika Johnson, Abi Titmuss, Dannii Minogue, although the amount of those settlements have still to be disclosed.

Law said the settlement showed that News Group Newspapers had admitted "the extent of their illegal activity," the Press Gazette report said.

"It is clear that I, along with many others, was kept under constant surveillance for a number of years," Law said.

"No aspect of my private life was safe from intrusion by News Group Newspapers, including the lives of my children and the people who work for me," he said. "It was not just that my phone messages were listened to. News Group also paid people to watch me and my house for days at a time and to follow me and those close to me, both in this country and abroad."

"They have accepted that the information published in the News of the World articles and the Sun articles that I complained about was private. I hope this means that they will never invade my privacy again. They have also finally given a proper apology," Law said, according to the Press Gazette.

In July last year News Group Newspapers announced the closure of the NotW in the midst of allegations that staff at the paper had commissioned private investigators to hack into mobile phones of hundreds of public figures to listen to voicemail messages.

The hacking of phones is a crime under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA).

Under RIPA both the hacker of a mobile phone and those who commissioned the hacking risk prosecution. The law does not give the accused the right to claim the hacking activity was conducted in the public interest.

'Blagging' of personal data, like mobile phone numbers, is also an offence under the UK's data protection laws, although there is a public interest defence available to justify that action.

Mr Justice Vos, the judge overseeing the settlement agreements at the High Court, has said senior management at the NotW hatched a "carefully conceived plan to delete emails" linking staff at the paper to hacking offences when the paper was moving offices in 2010, according to a report by the Daily Mail.