Communications Law

Communications Law

Communications Law is a well-respected, peer reviewed, quarterly journal covering the broad spectrum of legal issues arising in the telecoms, IT and media industries Each issue brings you 32 pages of opinion and discussion from the field of communications law.

Editor in Chief:

Dr Peter Coe, Associate Professor in Law, University of Birmingham

Editors:

• Dr Eliza Bechtold, University of Aberdeen
• Paul Chamberlain, Paramount
• Clive Davies, Independent Legal Consultant
• Campbell Deane, Bannatyne, Kirkwood, France & Co
• Brian Dowrick, Senior Lecturer in Law, Law School, University of South Wales
• Dr Faith Gordon, ANU College of Law, The Australian National University
• Dr Jeevan Hariharan, Queen Mary University
• Howard Johnson, Part-time Senior Teaching Fellow, Cardiff Law School
• Rebecca Moosavian, University of Leeds
• Rem Noormohamed, Lawyer, Fieldfisher
• Dr Laura Scaife, Associate, McDermott Will & Emery
• Brian Pillans, Lecturer in Law, Glasgow Caledonian University
• Dr Jelena Surculija Milojevic, University of Belgrade
• Judith Townend, University of Sussex
• Dr Paul Wragg, University of Leeds

News Editor:

Campbell Deane, Bannatyne, Kirkwood, France & Co

Advisory Panel:

• Eduardo Bertoni, Global Clinical Professor, NYU. Representative of the Regional Office for South America of the Inter American Institute of Human Rights. He was the first Director of the Access to Public Information Agency (AAIP) which is the Argentine Data Protection and Access to Information Authority.
• Richard Caddell, Lecturer in Law, Cardiff Universtity
• Michael Epstein, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School, Los Angeles; Supervising Editor of the Journal of International Media and Entertainment Law
• Simon Gallant, Consultant, Gallant Maxwell
• Thomas Gibbons, School of Law, University of Manchester
• Wolfgang Kleinwächter, University of Aarhus, Special Adviser to the Chair of the UN Internet Governance Forum
• Jeremy Landau, Partner, Taylor Wessing LLP
• David Rolph, Professor of Law, University of Sydney
• Michael D Scott, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School, Los Angeles; Director, International IT Law Summer Programme in London
• Gavin Sutter, Research Fellow, Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary, University of London
• Professor Ian Walden, Head of the Institute of Computer and Communications Law, Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary, University of London and consultant to Baker & McKenzie
• Kyu Ho Youm, Jonathan Marshall First Amendment Chair Professor, School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon

This article examines speech/privacy balancing under the tort of misuse of private information, in order to argue that the past down-grading of privacy within the balancing act as a feature of pre-HRA jurisprudence, and of the early post-HRA years, could be replicated in future. It will be argued that the Strasbourg Court pays lip-service to the notion of the presumptive equality of Articles 8 and 10 ECHR, but it is nevertheless embracing the idea that the notoriety of the individual claiming privacy invasion should lead to a down-grading of their expectation of privacy when balancing the two Articles. This article proceeds to argue that, due to a range of current domestic factors, including recent judicial pronouncements as to the judges’ role under the HRA, the Strasbourg stance as to balancing may be more forcefully embraced domestically in future, meaning that a down-grading of claimed privacy interests may tend to occur: the current domestic rule as to the presumptive parity of Articles 8 and 10 in MPI cases could be undermined. This article, therefore, is intended to send a warning to practitioners and commentators that those concerned with the value placed on private information in Campbell should be watchful for attempts by the domestic judiciary to revise the presumptive parity rule in light of the Axel Springer decision in future.

2024

This article examines how the UK press regulators balance freedom of expression against protecting transgender people from discriminatory reporting amid the growing polarisation over trans rights. It provides the first comprehensive analysis of IPSO’s and IMPRESS’ rulings on trans-related complaints, offering novel insights into the intersections of news production, audience reception and press regulation. The research reveals that IPSO’s myopic approach overlooks the prejudicial nuances in humour, visuals and the interplay between inaccuracy and discrimination, allowing dominant trans stereotypes criticised in the Leveson Report to persist. Conversely, IMPRESS’ engagement with trans issues is very limited compared to IPSO’s but its newly-adopted ‘discursive harm’ model is a promising step in the right direction. The paper concludes that it is only by prioritising the standpoints of marginalised trans people and firmly incorporating these into journalistic practices and press regulation that news media can contribute constructively to the public dialogue over trans inclusion.