You may not like Prince Harry but his win against the Mirror is huge – and he’s not finished yet | James Hanning

Piers Morgan now has a problem, but so too does much of the press. It is in the crosshairs of a man on a mission

• James Hanning is a former deputy editor of the Independent on Sunday and author of The News Machine

Here's a thought for key sections of the British press: be afraid, be very afraid. Prince Harry's battle with the Mirror Group (MGN) and his success today will come as no surprise to those who have studied the working methods of the red-top newspapers over the last few decades, so brace yourself for more revelations. The availability of the technology to snoop on their targets made it daft, in a highly competitive market, not to hack phones. If it looked as if the other side was doing it - and the law requires us to say that there is no confirmation that the Sun was indeed doing so - then you would be missing a trick not to do it yourself.

How did it work? Initially, it was done by experts sitting in dingy suburban offices, but then the editors and their accountants realised there was no need for the experts, and it became a free-for-all. Why pay for a hack to stand on someone's doorstep when you could get someone in the office to do some finger-fishing", as it was sometimes called, on any number of people?