The Pros And Cons Of Invasion Of Privacy

Invasion of privacy is a social phenomenon which affects the life of many people

across the world. It has been defined by Judge Cooley as the “right to be left alone”.

In this particular case, Jason Watson was getting engaged to Sofia Rodriguez and their

photos were published without their consent by the Newsroom Daily. According to the

clause 18 of the contract, it was clearly mentioned that only What’s New? Daily had the

right to take and publish pictures of the engagement party. They even paid a large sum of

money to acquire those rights. Based on the Douglas v Hello! Ltd, the couple can claim for

invasion of privacy, breach of confidence and breach of Data Protection Act 1998.

It can be argued that because of the clause 18, those photographs taken are

classified as private and confidential information. Disclosure of such information by a third

party is unlawful and a duty will be imposed by the law. This clause was an obvious

constraint on the Newsroom Daily. However they breached that clause and they succeeded

in taking pictures of inferior quality despite the tight security which was present at that

time. In doing so, they infringed the privacy of Jason and Sofia and they violated Article 8 of

the Human Right Act 1998. Article 8 can be defined as follows:

“Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence”

Following this statement, it can be concluded that this Article provides protection for a

person’s private and family life.

In contrast against Article 8, the right to freedom of expression contained in Article

10 provides that:

“Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and t...

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...ction Mirror Newspaper for unauthorised disclosure about her treatment.

Although photographing persons will not generally constitute a breach of

confidence but when a person takes appropriate security measures to prevent any leakage

of the information, this will make it an occasion of confidentiality as far as photography is

concerned. This was confirmed by the case Creation Record Ltd v News Group Newspaper .

However, Newsroom Daily can appeal to prevent the injunction by using the public interest defence. If successful, the injunction will be avoided both at interlocutory stage and

at trial. Newsroom Daily must show that the public interest disclosure is outweighed by the

public interest in its publication. Newsroom Daily must demonstrate what it claims is the

positive effect for the public on it being able to publish the confidential information