This round up covers law and media developments during August since our last Law and Media Round Up on 29 July 2024.  Our regular weekly round ups will resume on Monday 30 September 2024, the day before the commencement of the Michaelmas Legal Term and of the new legal year.

News Group Newspapers (NGN), the publisher of The Sun, has agreed to search for documents that may relate to allegations it invented a “fake security threat” to justify the wiping of “millions of incriminating emails.” Court documents reveal NGN faces accusations it created a “false narrative” that a Labour peer conspired with ex-prime minster Gordon Brown to obtain stolen data as part of a bid to conceal wrongdoing and “subvert” police investigations into the phone-hacking scandal. The Press Gazette has more information here.

Sir Van Morrison’s long-running defamation battle with the former Stormont Health Minister Robin Swann has been settled. Mr Swann sued the singer for slander after Sir Van declared that the politician was “very dangerous” in front of an audience at Belfast’s Europa Hotel in June 2021. The BBC has more information here.

A libel claim brought against The Bureau of Investigative Journalism by a UK-based investment holding company which objected to reporting about its alleged links to a former president of Kazakhstan has been dropped after two years. TBIJ’s terms of settlement with Jusan Technologies Ltd are confidential and there is a fixed sum in costs to be paid. The Press Gazette has more information here.

Dyson has ended its libel claim against Channel 4 News and the programme’s producer ITN after more than two years of proceedings. A joint statement from Channel 4 and ITN said: “Despite prolonged and costly court proceedings, Channel 4 News was determined to defend its fair, accurate, and duly impartial reporting. The freedom to report without fear or favour is essential to both the industry and a thriving democracy.” The Press Gazette has more information here.

French police have arrested the founder of the direct messaging platform Telegram. Pavel Durov has been accused of facilitating the widespread crimes committed on the platform. He has been released on bail but is banned from leaving France. Inforrm had an article which considers the potential impact on Big Tech.

Internet and Social Media

Clean Up The Internet and Paul Bernal’s Blog both have articles examining the use of social media in the far-right riots that took place in the UK in August. The LSE Media Policy Project also has an article that examines whether the Online Safety Act 2023 is fit for purpose in light of the recent riots and the online hate speech and misinformation that likely contributed to the unrest. The Media Coalition Blog has an article on the mainstream media’s complicity.

The Cyberleagle blog has published Part 5 of its series of reflections on Ofcom’s Illegal Harms Consultation under the Online Safety Act.

The LSE Media Policy Project also has an article explaining some of the reasons that the EU lags behind the US and China in terms of cloud computing, despite the bloc’s ambitions for digital sovereignty.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has issued a statement in response to Meta’s announcement on user data to train AI.

Data Privacy and Data Protection

The ICO officially launched its Privacy Notice Generator on 20 August 2024. The tool offers small and medium enterprises (SMEs) an easy step-by-step process that will create tailored privacy notices that are geared toward the business’s specific role in the UK economy, such as finance, insurance, law, education, childcare, retail and manufacturing, as well as for the nonprofit sector.

The ICO has called on eleven social media and video sharing platforms to improve their children’s privacy practices, warning that non-compliance will face enforcement action.

On 10 September 2024, the ICO announced that it signed a memorandum of understanding with the UK National Crime Agency related to cyber resilience.

The ICO has issued a reprimand to the Labour Party for repeatedly failing to respond to people who asked what personal information the party held on them – known as a subject access request. Read the ICO press statement here.

Privacy International has an article explaining how large language models threaten privacy and data protection rights.

Art, Music and Copyright

IP Kat uses the recent Oasis reunion to recap some of the IP issues that have concerned the band over the years. The article explains how these issues remain some of the most topical ones in copyright law.

Buzzfeed has issued a cease and desist letter to an AI news aggregator, claiming the start-up’s logo is an infringement of its copyright. The Press Gazette has more information here.

Newspapers Journalism and Regulation

The Media Reform Coalition has published a “partial study of impartiality”, which argues that the Asserson Report on the BBC’s ‘anti-Israel bias’ is both flawed and completely at odds with the realities of the war in Gaza.

Hacked Off has an article exploring the future of press regulation and the public outcry for trusted journalism evidenced in recent focus groups.

IPSO

New Issued Cases

There were ten defamation (libel and slander) claims, two data protection claims, one Norwich Pharmacal Order application and one miscellaneous claim filed on the media and communications list in the last month.

Last month in the Courts

On Monday 29 July 2024, Collins Rice J heard an application for a final injunction in the case of Northcott v Hundeyin KB-2023-002761

On the same day Johnson J heard a contempt application in the case of Hijazi v Yaxley-Lennon.

On Tuesday 30 July 2024 there was a statement in open court in the case of Singh v Cartland and a return date hearing the case of Synnovis Services v Persons Unknown.

On 1 August 2024 judgment was handed down in the preliminary issue trial of Paisley v Linehan [2024] EWHC 1976 (KB). The claimant describes himself as a former actor who campaigns for women’s rights and against domestic violence. The defendant is a television writer who describes his beliefs as “gender-critical”, meaning that he believes that a person’s sex is immutable and that philosophies prioritising a person’s self-declared gender over their sex can undermine the protection of vulnerable women. In 2020 the defendant created public Substack account, the main purpose of which he says was to publish articles around gender ideology and women’s rights. Members of the public were able to post comments on an article and reply to other existing comments. The claimant, Mr Paisley, brought a claim for libel and other torts in respect of 7 publications on Substack, consisting of articles by the defendant, readers’ comments or a combination of both. Held, all the Publications complained of were defamatory at common law and the meanings they bore are set out at [102]. CMS Law Now has more information here.

On 23 August 2024, Mrs Justice Steyn gave judgment on qualified privilege and meaning in Hawrami v Journalism Development Network Inc & Ors [2024] EWHC 2194 (KB). Dr Ashti Hawrami served as the Minister of Natural Resources in the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq (‘the KRG’) and then as the Assistant Prime Minister for Energy Affairs in the KRG. He has brought defamation proceedings against the Defendants, Journalism Development Network Inc, which is the publisher of the OCCRP website, and two journalists, for a website publication entitled “The Rise and Fall of a US Oilman,” which contained references to Dr Hawrami. The Defence disputed the defamatory meanings complained of by Dr Hawrami, denied that the publication was defamatory of him and relied, in the alternative, upon statutory qualified privilege as a fair and accurate report of the judgment and proceedings in a High Court commercial case Excalibur Ventures LLC v Texas Keystone Inc & Ors [2013] EWHC 2767 (Comm) and public interest pursuant to s 4 of the Defamation Act 2013.  The claimant contended that the s.15 defence had no real prospect of success because the Excalibur judgment and proceedings contain nothing capable of being defamatory or discreditable to him; on the contrary, the judgment records statements to the claimant’s credit. So, if the Article is defamatory of him (as the claimant contends), it cannot be a fair and accurate report of the Excalibur judgment or proceedings. Whereas, if it is not defamatory of him, the s.15 defence is otiose. Held, the defence of qualified privilege fails; the natural and ordinary meanings (set out at [149] of the judgment) are defamatory at common law. Steyn J found that a fair reading of the Excalibur judgment gave the impression that Dr Hawrami is a man of honour and integrity, working against corruption and in the interests of the autonomous region of Kurdistan [74]. While there were sections of the article where it was sufficiently apparent to the reader that the source of material was the Excalibur proceedings, they were not a fair and accurate report of those proceedings for the purposes of paragraph 2 of Part I of Schedule 1 to the 1996 Act. 5RB has a summery here.

On 6 September 2024, Mrs Justice Steyn handed down judgment in the case of Parish v Wikimedia Foundation [2024] EWHC 2301 (KB) [doc].  An order granting the claimant permission to serve a libel claim on the defendant out of the jurisdiction was set aside.  The claimant was held to have failed to satisfy the “Forum Test”,  In addition, there were highly material non-disclosures by the claimant which would have required the order to be set aside.  Furthermore, as a result of the operation of section 8 of the Defamation Act 2013, there was no real prospect of the claimant defeating a limitation defence.

Media Law in Other Jurisdictions

Australia

On 13 September 2024, the Australian Government published a draft Bill outlining the next steps in Australia’s Privacy Act Review process. DLA Piper sets out the changes to be implemented by the Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. IAPP has commentary here.

Former New South Wales One Nation leader Mark Latham has been found to have defamed independent politician Alex Greenwich and has been ordered to pay $140,000 in damages. The Guardian has more information here.

The defamation trial between Victoria’s opposition leader John Pesutto and ex-Liberal MP Moira Deeming began in the federal court last week. The Guardian provides a brief background to the trial.

Brazil

An unprecedented court order has blocked Twitter/X in Brazil, with individuals facing significant fines if they try to circumvent the order to access the service by using a VPN. The case raises many questions about enforcing domestic laws, political and tech power, and the impact on individual rights and freedoms. Michael Geist’s Law Bytes podcast discusses the order.

China

The PRC government sentenced Wang Jiangfeng (王江峰) to two years imprisonment for the crime of “disturbing the peace” (寻衅滋事, also translated as “picking quarrels and provoking troubles”) for posting text and images on WeChat and QQ that, it claimed “berated and denigrated” Mao Zedong and Xi Jinping. The Fei Chang Dao blog provides a translation of the judgment.

The PRC government sentenced Sun Zhiming (孙志明, who wrote under the alias Sun Daluo (孙大骆)) to one year imprisonment for the crime of “disturbing the peace” (寻衅滋事, also translated as “picking quarrels and provoking troubles”) for authoring, publishing, and sharing political books and articles that, according to the court, contained “fake information” about Mao Zedong, Xi Jinping, and the Communist Party. The Fei Chang Dao blog provides a translation of the judgment.

India

A court in Mumbai has taken a pro-publicity and -personality rights stance in an ex-parte ad-interim order concerning the unauthorised use and cloning of Indian artist Arijit Singh’s voice by multiple defendants. IP Kat has an article explaining the example this judgment sets for publicity rights in the AI era.

Ireland

Ireland has published the long-awaited Defamation (Amendment) Bill 2024. The Bill covers issues such as the abolition of juries in defamation cases, requiring serious harm in instances of defamation of bodies corporate, providing for qualified privilege in cases of transient retail defamation, clarifying aspects of the offer to make amends procedure, providing a new defence in relation to live broadcasts and significant new provisions relating to engagement in public participation and alternative dispute resolution. Cearta.ie’s commentary on the new Bill can be read here and here and here.

The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) has welcomed X’s agreement to suspend its processing of certain personal data for the purpose of training its AI chatbot tool, Grok. This comes after the DPC issued suspension proceedings against X in the Irish High Court.  The DPC described this as the first time that any Lead Supervisory Authority had taken such an action, and the first time that it had utilised these particular powers. DLA Piper has more information here. The Privacy and Information Law Blog has more information here.

Netherlands

On 3 September 2024, the Dutch Data Protection Authority announced a €30.5 million fine against Clearview AI for the processing of personal data related to its biometric data database.

United States

Fiona Harvey’s defamation lawsuit against Netflix over  the Baby Reindeer controversy has been set a trial date of 6 May 2025. Harvey, the Scottish lawyer who confirmed online speculation that she was the person who inspired the show’s stalker character Martha Scott, is trying to sue the streamer for defamation after she alleged that the story is inaccurate and falsely depicted her as a convicted criminal who spent time in prison for stalking.

Research and Resources

Reserved Judgments

Dowding v The Character Group PLC 19 and 20 June 2024 (Richard Spearman KC)

Codnor v Thorpe, 17 June 2024 (Richard Spearman KC).

MBR Acres v FREE THE MBR BEAGLES, heard 24-28 April 2023, 2-5, 9, 11-12, 15, 17-18, 22-23 May 2023 (Nicklin J)

Colette Allen is the host of Newscast on Dr Thomas Bennett and Professor Paul Wragg’s The Media Law Podcast (@MediaLawPodcast).