HP appoints ethics and compliance officer

Jon Hoak to lead vendor's adherence to Standards of Business Conduct.

Scandal-hit HP has appointed a chief ethics and compliance officer charged with putting the vendor back on the straight and narrow.

Jon Hoak will be responsible for HP's adherence to its Standards of Business Conduct, and will report to chairman and chief executive Mark Hurd until a general counsel is named.

"HP has traditionally led the industry in adherence to standards of ethics, privacy and corporate responsibility, and with Jon's guidance we will lead again," said Hurd.

Hoak replaces Kevin Hunsaker, who resigned last month amid the furore over methods HP used to expose the source of board-level leaks.

Private investigators hired by HP used a variety of dubious tactics, including accessing private phone records.

Hunsaker and former HP chairman Patricia Dunn have been charged with identity theft, but deny that they sanctioned the private investigators' tactics.

Prior to joining HP, Hoak was general counsel at NCR from 1993 until May 2006 and previously served three years as an attorney at AT&T. He has also been a partner at law firm Sidley Austin.

One of Hoak's first tasks will be working with external lawyer Bart Schwartz, formerly an assistant US attorney, hired last month to perform an independent assessment of current investigative methods and develop future best practices.