Mosley Loses Privacy Case
Former Formula One boss Max Mosley has lost his legal challenge to force newspapers to warn people before publishing stories on their private lives – after a European court ruled that such a system would have a ‘chilling effect’ on the press.
The ruling from the European court of human rights, in Strasbourg, marks the final stage of Mosley’s campaign for tighter privacy laws – after the newspaper News of the World ran revelations about his sex life.
Mosley was awarded £60,000 in damages in 2008 after the UK high court ruled that there was no justification for a front-page article and pictures about his meeting with five prostitutes.
The ex-F1 boss has since pursued the case to the European court to challenge UK privacy laws that allow publication of personal stories without giving advanced warnings to their ‘targets’.
The News of the World ran the story on the front page, as well as photographs and video footage on the website, which the court ruled were: ‘included in the News of the World’s coverage merely to titillate the public and increase the embarrassment of the applicant’.
Regarding Mosley’s challenge of UK laws to offer advanced warning to people, the court said that such a pre-notification process for newspaper exposés would be likely to have a ‘chilling effect’ on the media, and that there are ‘significant doubts’ as to the effectiveness of such a system.
According to media reports, newspapers bosses have also warned that imposing a pre-publication notification to toughen the right to private life laws would amount to a breach of the right to freedom of expression.
