LONDON — Britain’s best-selling Sunday tabloid the News of the World signed off with a simple front page message –  “THANK YOU & GOODBYE” –  leaving the media establishment here reeling from the expanding phone-hacking scandal that brought down the muckraking newspaper after 168 years.

Journalists crafted the newspaper’s own obituary before sending the tabloid’s final edition to the printing presses Saturday night, apologizing for letting its readers down but stopping short of acknowledging recent allegations that staff paid police for information.

“We praised high standards, we demanded high standards but, as we are now only too painfully aware, for a period of a few years up to 2006 some who worked for us, or in our name, fell shamefully short of those standards,” read a message posted on the tabloid’s website.

“Quite simply, we lost our way. Phones were hacked, and for that this newspaper is truly sorry.”

Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corp. media empire owns the paper, will arrive in London today on a scheduled visit, a person familiar with his itinerary told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Buying the News of the World in 1969 gave the Australian-born Murdoch his first foothold in Britain’s media.

He went on to snap up several other titles, gaining almost unparalleled influence in British politics through the far-reaching power of his papers’ headlines.

Now he is facing a maelstrom of outrage over the sequence of events set off by allegations that the paper’s journalists paid police for information and hacked into the voicemails of young murder victims and dead soldiers’ grieving families.

The recent revelations culminated in the decision to close the paper and put 200 journalists out of work –  but the move failed to stem broader questions about corruption at the newspaper and press regulation in the U.K.

The sordid affair has played out at breakneck pace in the media and prompted soul-searching at the highest levels of officialdom. Prime Minister David Cameron has called for a new press regulation system and pledged a public inquiry into what went wrong; the head of Murdoch’s U.K. newspaper operations has alluded that more revelations are yet to come.

As the News of the World’s final issue went to press, Assistant Police Commissioner John Yates expressed his “extreme regret” that he did not reopen police inquiries into phone hacking two years ago. He told the Sunday Telegraph, “It’s clear I could have done more.”

But Murdoch has remained largely silent amid the fallout, issuing one official statement describing the allegations as “deplorable and unacceptable.”

The tabloid’s final edition hits newsstands today.

The front page bears an epitaph, “the world’s greatest newspaper 1843-2011” and a smaller headline with the words: “After 168 years, we finally say a sad but very proud farewell to our 7.5m loyal readers.”

Throughout the day, journalists at the tabloid expressed their sadness and pride in working for an iconic news brand.

Small clues gave the tone of the London newsroom away –  from a commemorative T-shirt bearing a “Goodbye, cruel News of the World, I’m leaving you today” worn by one staffer.

The paper’s editor, Colin Myler, offered words of encouragement and sympathy to his staff on a “very difficult day.”

“It’s not where we want to be and it’s not where we deserve to be,” he said in a memo to staff seen by Britain’s Press Association. “But I know we will produce a paper to be proud of.”

Much of the emotion continued to focus on News International –  News Corp.’s British subsidiary –  which took the decision to jettison the paper Thursday after the new allegations sparked a fierce backlash and the flight of advertisers.

When asked who decided to close the paper, Murdoch said, “It was a collective decision.”

The scandal exploded last week after it was reported that the News of the World had hacked murder victim Milly Dowler’s mobile phone in 2002 while her family and police were desperately searching for her.

News of the World operatives reportedly deleted some messages from the phone’s voicemail, giving the 13-year-old girl’s parents false hope that she was still alive.

That ignited public outrage far beyond any previous reaction to press intrusion into the lives of politicians and celebrities, which the paper has acknowledged and for which it has paid compensation to some prominent victims.

Many journalists and media watchers have expressed astonishment that Rebekah Brooks, who was editor of News of the World when some of the hacking allegedly occurred, was keeping her job at head of News Corp.’s U.K. newspaper operations while the paper’s 200 employees were laid off.

When asked Saturday if Brooks continues to have his support, Murdoch replied simply: “Total.”