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Privacy tort

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Is it possible that Todd Barclay did not commit an offence?

Tuesday, June 20th, 2017

Newsroom has done a terrific job of trying to get to the bottom of the allegation that National MP Todd Barclay secretly recorded his former electorate agent Glenys Dickson. Newsroom claims Barclay left a dictaphone in the Gore electorate office and recorded Dickson’s side of phone conversations. It suggests that he may have recorded conversations […]

The blogger and the journalist

Tuesday, October 28th, 2014

The Whale certainly created a splash in the last election. More accurately, it was investigative journalist Nicky Hager and his book Dirty Politics that created the splash. The Whale – controversial right-wing blogger Cameron Slater and his Whale Oil blog, whose emails were leaked to Mr Hager – copped most of the spray. (I should […]

Post at your own risk!

Thursday, February 13th, 2014

An interesting warning from the Northern Ireland High Court: Before I go on … I should say that anyone who uses Facebook does so at his or her peril. There is no guarantee that any comments posted to be viewed by friends will only be seen by those friends. Furthermore it is difficult to see […]

Can Len Brown sue for invasion of privacy?

Thursday, October 17th, 2013

It’s always a bit dangerous to speculate on the legal significance of facts when a story is still emerging and not all those facts have come out. And the tort of invasion of privacy is still itself emerging from the misty depths of New Zealand’s common law, so its outline is not entirely clear either. […]

We don’t need no stinking press regulation

Thursday, December 6th, 2012

The Herald’s lawyer, Alan Ringwood, argues that we don’t need any statutory press regulation in NZ. Don’t listen to Levenson, he says. We don’t need to go there. (Full article here). I guess it’s not a news flash that the Herald’s lawyer would oppose statutory restrictions on the Herald. But I’m interested in his argument. […]

Lawsuit for intrusion allowed in NZ

Sunday, August 26th, 2012

At a time when the British tabloids are wringing their hands over whether to publish naked photos of Prince Harry, the High Court in NZ has ruled that the mere taking of such photos, whether or not they are published, is an actionable breach of privacy. The case involved a woman who was filmed naked […]

Threats! Email! Action!

Tuesday, June 5th, 2012

Barrister and privacy whizz John Edwards has found a way to get a quick injunction when privacy protection is urgently needed. It helps that the case looks like a slam dunk. The circumstances have a familiar ring: an ACC claimant mistakenly given private details about some other claimant’s claim, including her rehabilitation, threatens by email to release them, then when […]

Should we have a tort of intrusion?

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

How far does our privacy tort stretch? Does it – should it – include offensive intrusions into someone’s affairs? It is well established now that you can sue for invasion of privacy if someone offensively publishes sensitive private facts about you and there’s no redeeming public interest. A newspaper reveals you had an abortion as […]

Of sneaky devices

Sunday, November 13th, 2011

John Key’s cunning plan to send a signal to the troops by sitting down for a cuppa with Act’s John Banks may have come undone by another sneaky device. It seems that the conversation was recorded and may contain “game-changing” comments, according to the Herald on Sunday. The paper says a freelance cameraman was stopped from […]

Staggering bunk from Collins over surveillance bill

Tuesday, October 4th, 2011

Apparently, Police Minister Judith Collins has a law degree. That was not evident during her performance on Morning Report today. Was she deliberately misleading us, or did she simply not know what she was talking about? She said: Actually, video surveillance has been used by the police with the support of the Court of Appeal […]

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