Inforrm's Blog

On Friday 17 May 2019, the Court of Appeal (Lewison, McCombe and Haddon-Cave LJJ) handed down a judgment ([2019] EWCA Civ 852) which comprehensively reversed the decision of the first instance judge, Mr Justice Jay, given after a 7 day libel trial. Read the rest of this entry »

The President of Family Division has published draft guidance as to reporting in the Family Courts [pdf]. There is a consultation running until 30 June 2019. This covered on the Transparency Project blog and there are reports in the Law Society Gazette and in the Press Gazette. Read the rest of this entry »

The short Easter legal term began on Tuesday 30 April 2019 and ends 4½ weeks later on 24 May 2019.  This will be a busy term. This is the end of the Inforrm Easter break. Read the rest of this entry »

This week finally saw the publication of the long awaited White Paper on Online Harms.  We had a post about the launch. It attracted generally positive responses across various media  – although no one was wholly convinced by the proposals. Read the rest of this entry »

On 3 April 2019 the Supreme Court handed down judgment in the libel appeal of Stocker v Stocker ([2019] UKSC 17).  The Judge’s determination on meaning was reversed and judgment was entered for the defendant. Read the rest of this entry »

The Government’s White Paper on online harms was due to be published on 25 March 2019 but has been delayed. Ministers perhaps have other things on their minds.  A Government spokesman said it would be published “shortly”. Read the rest of this entry »

A review by the Digital Competition Expert Panel published on 13 March 2019 has, perhaps unsurprisingly, found that  large digital technology companies do not face enough competition. Read the rest of this entry »

On 9 March 2019 the House of Lords Communications Committee published its report “Regulating in a Digital World” concluding that the digital world needs a different approach to regulation. Read the rest of this entry »

In another libel victory for a politician against a national newspapers, Daniel Poulter MP has succeeded in his claims for libel, misuse of private information and breach of confidence against the Times. Read the rest of this entry »

This week The House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee has published its final report on “Disinformation and ‘fake news’” [pdf].  We had a news post and some initial thoughts from Zoe McCallum. The report was widely covered in the media, including in the Guardian, the BBC and the Press Gazette. Read the rest of this entry »