Could ‘News of the World’ Scandal Cost News Corp. Its U.S. FCC Licenses?

The News of the World hacking scandal that has rocked Great Britain may yet have an impact on News Corp.’s businesses  stateside. On ABC’s “This Week,” the panel discussed the possibility that the FCC could revoke News Corp.’s broadcasting licenses under a “character” clause every company must adhere to.

Fox News Channel would not be affected, as cable channels are not regulated by the FCC.

Or as media tycoon Steven Brill explained:

“News Corp has a lot of FCC licenses there’s still a clause in the federal communications law that requires that you have to be of good character to have such a license, and I was reading last night just in the approval that they gave Comcast to take over NBC, there was actually some guy who challenged the character of Comcast because when they installed a cable system somewhere they had hurt his building, and didn’t pay for it and this became a big legal proceeding, action. So here I am reasonably certain that someone, maybe someone from the political left or whoever is going to make a big deal of whether they are fit to have their FCC licenses under the current management.”

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