A CONVICTED phone hacker has claimed the News of the World routinely hacked the phone of David Beckham.

The paper's former head of news Greg Miskiw, who served just over one month of a six month prison sentence in 2014 for intercepting voicemail messages, is the first of the defunct paper's journalists to admit the former footballer was targeted.

But Miskiw, 65, said: "The objective was very simple, just get the story… no matter what, no matter how."

He told Channel 4 News: “We hacked David Beckham's phones routinely, all the time, over and over again.”

He said the crime took part during investigations around stories, including a story about the footballer's alleged affair with his then PA Rebecca Loos. Beckham has denied claims of an affair.

He told Channel 4 News: “The David Beckham story, we had to track all these phones.

“From recollection [on that particular story] I don’t think we got anything of any significance from doing Beckham’s phones."

Miskiw also said he was 'devastated' to learn the tabloid had hacked murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler’s phone

He said: “I was in Florida at the time and I just lay down on my bed and stared at the fan for a couple of hours thinking how awful.

“It was like a scene out of a movie. I was just absolutely devastated, absolutely devastated."

He added that all he could say to the Dowler family was “terribly sorry it happened”.

Miskiw said he was persuaded to speak out by another former tabloid journalist who was convicted of phone hacking.