2009–2011 News of the World phone hacking scandal investigations the next several years. The case had been expected to reveal the details of previous settlements the paper had made, including the £1 million spent in 2009, settling with three phone hacking victims, and the unfair dismissal claim won by Clive Goodman. Clifford had won court rulings in February earlier that year that meant that the "News of the World" would have had to disclose previously secret information regarding which journalists were involved in hacking voicemail messages. A judge ruled that Glenn Mulcaire had to disclose the names of all the journalists who targeted Clifford and also those who received
Media coverage in conjunction with the news media phone hacking scandal announced in December 2011 that there was no evidence phone hacking of Milly Dowler's phone by agents of "News of the World" had caused messages to be deleted or give her parents false hope of her being alive, the Australian, which is owned by News International carried the article published by "The Times", also a News International newspaper, strongly critical of "The Guardian" and their investigative reporter, Nick Davies who broke the story. The article raised the question, "whether the paper would still exist if The Guardian had not erroneously blamed it for the Dowlers' false hope." The article contained