What does David Beckham have in common with Sony and the Democratic National Committee ? Hacked emails that are apparently reputation-shredding – plus enough media attention paid to the details of the leaked content to overshadow the actual crime . The Daily Mail reports that police in Portugal have launched an investigation into an attack on the servers at Beckham ’ s PR firm , Doyen Global , which is run by his friend Simon Oliveira . The police have reportedly been investigating the attack for the past 12 months . According to the Telegraph , the hackers had allegedly demanded Attack.Ransom €1m ( $ 1.07m ) in exchange for destroying a dossier of some 18.6m emails and documents , which the ever-colorful British press have dubbed “ Beckileaks ” . A source told the Telegraph that the blackmailer ( s ) first made the pitch by email , using the fake name of Artem Lovuzov . “ Lovuzov ” allegedly told Doyen Sports chief executive Neilo Lucas that paying the money Attack.Ransom would ensure that no embarrassing messages were given to the press : A generous donation , and you can be sure that all the information I possess will be destroyed . The Beckham team didn ’ t respond , so the blackmailer set a deadline : I ’ m giving you until 16.00 on Tuesday to contact my lawyer with a view to a proper resolution to this impasse . Beckham and his team didn ’ t want to play the game . The hacker ( s ) didn ’ t stop at Team Beckham , though : they ’ ve reportedly targeted a number of businesses connected to the football world . It was then published by sites including Der Spiegel , L ’ Equipe and El Mundo . Former UK football star Beckham – a mega-celebrity who ’ s gone on to use his considerable clout to raise big sums of money for Unicef – has been faced with the publication of expletive-laced emails that make it look like he ’ s used the charity as a front to buff up his chances of knighthood . A spokesman for Beckham told the BBC that the alleged emails were “ hacked ” , “ doctored ” and “ private ” from a third-party server .