Happy New Year to all Inforrm readers. The Hilary Term begins today and run to Wednesday 16 April 2025.

Lawyers for former Prime Minister Liz Truss have sent a “cease and desist” letter to Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer requesting that he stop making “false and defamatory” statements to the effect that Ms Truss “crashed the economy” with her 2022 mini-budget. The letter sent on behalf of Ms Truss claims that the mini-budget did not result in an economic crash because unemployment did not rise and economic output did not fall. There was a post on The Empty City Substack about the letter and The Brett Wilson Media and Communication Law Blog analysed the merits of the proposed claim here. The BBC, LBC, Guardian and Firstpost have more information.

The letter was marked “Private and Confidential” but a full copy came into the hands of the Daily Telegraph which published the letter in full (albeit without footnotes and annexes).  As has been pointed out by several commentators, the letter contains no threat of any legal claim.

Internet and Social Media

Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced sweeping changes to the company’s approach to content moderation. After years of developing ‘trust and safety’ and content moderation systems and policies, Zuckerberg now asserts that Meta has “reached a point where it’s just too many mistakes and too much censorship.” Zuckerberg has decided to return to a system that he believes will prioritize free expression. Some of the specific policy changes announced include the elimination of fact-checkers in the US and replacing them with a “community notes” system similar to X (formerly Twitter), and “simplifying” content policies by removing certain restrictions on topics like immigration and gender. Tech Policy has more detail of the announced changes here. The LSE Media Blog considers how pivotal this announcement will be in the history of online speech governance. The Michael Geist Blog also comments on the announcement.

Data Privacy and Data Protection

Newly released data from messaging app Telegram reveals a sharp rise in the number of data demands it fulfilled over the past year for users’ data from requesting law enforcement agencies. The rise in fulfilled user requests comes months after French authorities arrested Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in August 2024 in part for the company’s long-standing refusal to provide user data in response to a child exploitation investigation. Soon after Durov’s arrest, Telegram appeared to relax its policy on how it handles abuse reports. See TechCrunch for more information.

Surveillance

Apple has agreed to pay $95 million to settle a civil lawsuit accusing the company of deploying its virtual assistant Siri to eavesdrop on people using its iPhone and other Apple devices. The proposed settlement, filed last week in the Californian Federal Court, would resolve a 5-year-old lawsuit revolving around allegations that Apple surreptitiously activated Siri to record conversations through iPhones and other devices equipped with the virtual assistant for more than a decade. The alleged recordings occurred even when people didn’t seek to activate the virtual assistant with the trigger words, “Hey, Siri.”  The lawsuit asserted that some of the recorded conversations were then shared with advertisers in an attempt to sell their products to consumers more likely to be interested in the goods and services. CBS News has more information here.

Newspapers Journalism and Regulation

The communications regulator Ofcom is currently carrying out a review of public service media (PSM), which it commits to doing at least every five years to ensure that public service broadcasters are meeting the purposes and objectives of PSM. The Media Reform Coalition looks at the recent phase one report published as part of this review and raises 5 questions that the PSM Media Review must answer.

The Media Reform Coalition has also published its views on the DCMS mergers regime consultation, arguing for a radical revision of UK law to protect media plurality.

Hacked Off has an article criticising the Daily Mail and MailOnline’s coverage of film producer Jeff Baena’s death. In the four days following the discovery of Baena’s suicide, the Mail published seventeen articles, with dozens more posts and videos spread across its website and social media platforms, including Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. Hacked Off argues that this frenzied approach by the newspaper, which examined many personal details about Baena and his surviving family’s personal life, raises serious ethical questions about responsible journalism around suicide.

IPSO

Statements in Open Court and Apologies

We are not aware of any statements in open court or apologies from the winter break.

New Issued Cases

There were two Defamation (libel and slander) claims and one Miscellaneous claim filed on the media and communications list since the last Round Up.

Last Month in the Courts

On 10 January 2025 judgment was handed down by Richard Spearman KC allowing the libel claim to continue in Marinakis v Karipidis & Ors [2025] EWHC 13 (KB). The shipping businessman and Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis, who also owns the Greek team Olympiacos, is bringing a claim in libel and unlawful means conspiracy over allegations that he had conducted match-fixing and was involved in a high-profile drug trafficking case in Greece. Mr Marinakis denies these accusations. The claim against the first, third and fourth defendants will continue [153], but the Judge did not consider the case against the Second Defendant to set out a basis for liability at common law [70]; the Second Defendant’s application to set aside an earlier Order granting permission to serve a Claim Form out of jurisdiction was therefore granted. The BBC, Nottingham Post, New York Times and Evening Standard have more information.

Media Law in Other Jurisdictions

Europe

For the first time, the EU has been found to have violated its own privacy rules established by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and ordered to pay a fine, Bindle v European Commission Case T‑354/22. The applicant was a German citizen who used the “Sign in with Facebook” option when registering for a conference through a European Commission webpage. When the user clicked that button, data about their device, browser, and IP address were transferred through a content delivery network managed by Amazon Web Services and eventually found its way to servers operated by Facebook’s parent company Meta Platforms in the United States. The court determined this transfer of data took place without proper safeguards, which amounts to a breach of GDPR rules, and the EU was ordered to pay a fine of €400 directly to the person who brought the case. Gizmodo has more information here.

India

India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology released the draft Digital Personal Data Protection Act Rules 2025 for public consultation until 18 February 2025. This marks a significant milestone in the evolving data protection landscape of the world’s largest democracy. The IAPP blog has more information here.

United States

The Supreme Court heard submissions last week on the proposed law that would ban TikTok in the US over national security concerns unless its China-based parent company sells the platform by 19 January 2025. TikTok has repeatedly denied any potential influence by the Chinese Communist Party and has argued the law violates the First Amendment free speech rights of its users. The nine justices will be expected to give their decision in the coming days. Commentators expect them to uphold the proposed legislation that will see the effective ban of the app over time. The BBC, Guardian, CNN, EuroNews, Aljazeera and Independent are some of the many titles to cover this ongoing story.

Rudy Giuliani has been found in contempt of court for failing to provide financial information related to the $148m defamation judgment he owes to two Georgia election workers. The Guardian has more information here.

Research and Resources

Next Week in the Courts 

We are not aware of any cases to be heard  in the Media and Communications List this week.mm 

[Update] On Tuesday 14 January 2025 there will be a hearing of an adjourned injunction application in the case of Hayden v Doyle, KB-2024-003867. 

On Wednesday 15 January 2025 there will be a hearing of an adjourned application in the case of Centreview Partners UK LLP v Ajikawo KB-2024-002080 .

On Friday 17 January 2025 there will be the hearing of an application in the case of Ben-Yair & Yair v Peaford KB-2024-003964.

 

Reserved Judgments

Ashley v The Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, heard 2 and 3 December 2024 (Heather Williams J)

Smith & Jackson v Surridge, heard 25 November – 3 December 2024 (Saini J)

Ashley v The Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, heard 2-3 December 2024 (Heather Williams J)

Miller v Peake, heard 18 to 20 November 2024 (HHJ Parkes KC)

RTM v Bonne Terre Limited and another, heard 11 to 15 November 2024 (Collins Rice J)

Vince v Bailey, heard 11-12 November 2024 (Pepperall J)

Vince v Tice and Vince v Staines heard 11 November 2024 (Pepperall J)

Secretary of State for Education v Marples, 4 November 2024, (Sir Peter Lane)

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).