Murdoch says 'someone took charge of a cover-up'

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Rupert Murdoch said on Thursday there was a 'cover-up' over phone hacking at the News of the World tabloid but that it was kept hidden from him and senior executives in his media empire.

Murdoch also told Britain's media ethics inquiry he had 'failed' by not pressing for further internal investigation into the paper, which he closed down in July last year amid outrage over the hacking of a murdered girl's phone.

"I think the senior execs were all... misinformed and all shielded from anything that was going on there and I do blame one or two people for that whom I shouldn't name because for all I know they may be arrested yet," he said.

"There's no question in my mind that, maybe even the editor but beyond that, someone took charge of a cover-up which we were victim to and I regret that."

The paper's royal editor and a private investigator were jailed in 2007 for phone hacking but the full scale of the practice at the paper did not emerge until a new police investigation launched in January 2011.

Pressed by the senior judge leading the inquiry, Brian Leveson, about why he did not take further action over allegations against one of his biggest-selling newspapers, Murdoch added: "I also have to say that I failed."