NEWS Ltd boss John Hartigan admits his newspapers were wrong to publish nude photos that falsely claimed to be of Pauline Hanson.

But he says the mistake shouldn't hurt an industry push for greater press freedom.

The News Ltd chairman and chief executive has told a Sydney conference that broader freedoms being sought by the media carry "enormous responsibilities".

"The media does make mistakes, as some of our newspapers realised last week and more mistakes will happen," he said.

"But in my 40-odd years working as a journalist, I can say with conviction that most mistakes happen because journalists are fallible, like everyone else, and very rarely do these mistakes come about because of malice, or an arrogant disregard by the media."