Nicholas Dobson considers the privacy v freedom of expression conflict in light of Mosley
While the law struggles to catch up with the global immediacy and openness of the Twittersphere, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has delivered a thoughtful judgment on the conflict between privacy and freedom of expression. This is, of course, the Mosley case (Mosley v United Kingdom [2011] ECHR 48009/08).
The background circumstances of the case are well known after publication of the March 2008 News of the World article: “F1 boss has sick Nazi orgy with 5 hookers”. In July 2008 Eady J had awarded Mosley £60K in damages and costs for breach of privacy in circumstances where there was no public interest or justification in the publication in question by the News of the World since he had found no Nazi connotations in Mosley’s sexual activities.
However, Mosley complained to the ECtHR that the UK had violated its positive obligations under Art 8 (right to respect for private and family life) by failing to impose a legal duty on the News of the World to
