'We won': Murdoch drops defamation suit against Crikey

Australian news site Crikey took out a full-page ad in the New York Times, daring Lachlan Murdoch to sue them - so he did.

Nine months later, the David and Goliath battle of the Australian media world ended with a whimper after the prince of the Murdoch empire quietly dropped his defamation suit.

After several rounds of legal fisticuffs involving inflammatory billboards, titillating texts and crowdfunding, the case was marked "discontinued/withdrawn" on the Federal Court website on Friday.

Mr Murdoch maintained through his lawyer there was no truth to the allegations made by Crikey.

In a joint statement, Private Media chief executive Will Hayward and chairman Eric Beecher called the withdrawal a "substantial victory" and reaffirmed their confidence in their journalism and legal defence.

"This is a victory for free speech. We won," they said.

"We stand by our position that Lachlan Murdoch was culpable in promoting the lie of the 2020 election result because he, and his father, had the power to stop the lies.

"We are proud of our stand. We are proud to have exposed the hypocrisy and abuse of power of a media billionaire."

Mr Murdoch's lawyer John Churchill said his client "remains confident that the court would ultimately find in his favour".

"However he does not wish to further enable Crikey's use of the court to litigate a case from another jurisdiction that has already been settled," Mr Churchill said in a statement.

Mr Hayward and Beecher labelled the suggestion "absurd".

"The fact is, Murdoch sued us, and then dropped his case," they said.

The withdrawal comes days after the Fox News network, whose CEO is Lachlan Murdoch, settled a lawsuit with a US voting system provider, Dominion, for $1.2 billion over false claims aired in the wake of the 2020 US presidential election.

The co-chairman of News Corp and CEO of Fox initially sued Crikey's publishers Private Media over a June 29 opinion piece titled "Trump is a confirmed unhinged traitor. And Murdoch is his unindicted co-conspirator".

Mr Murdoch argued it conveyed a meaning that he illegally conspired with former US President Donald Trump to "incite a mob with murderous intent to march on the Capitol" in Washington DC.

Mr Churchill says the American case was irrelevant to Crikey's litigation because the US plaintiff did not argue that Mr Murdoch was personally responsible for the January 6 uprising, which is what the Australian news site alleged.

The legal team called the case a "marketing campaign designed to attract subscribers and boost their (Crikey's) profits".

The legal stoush was portrayed as a small Australian news site fighting for a free and independent press against the multi-national media conglomerate with millions to spare.

From the beginning, the funding differences were stark.

Crikey set up a GoFundMe that collected $588,000 but fell well short of their $3 million goal.

Mr Murdoch hired high-profile barrister Sue Chrysanthou, who had previously defended former politician Christian Porter and media personality Lisa Wilkinson.

Crikey's defence argued Mr Murdoch was "morally and ethically culpable" for the attack on the Capitol, the publication was in the public's interest and the article did not cause serious harm to the plaintiff.

Outside the proceedings, Crikey paid for billboards that Ms Chrysanthou said mocked Mr Murdoch.

Revealing messages, originally released during the US lawsuit, were used by Crikey's legal team to back its argument Mr Murdoch knew the US stolen election claims were a lie, but that Fox presenters and guests were still encouraged to make the allegations to retain viewers and boost commercial gains.

"Half of what Donald said was good. The other half bulls*** and damaging. Big media, big money and big tech all against him and his vote in spite of this, a mighty achievement. But conspiracy with pollsters NO! Latter simply incompetent," Rupert Murdoch wrote in a November 2020 email.

Crikey's legal team, headed by Michael Bradley from Marque Lawyers, will pursue Mr Murdoch for costs.