British newspaper websites liable in France for privacy invasion

They always let you down in the end, the French.

...to rather badly quote Harold MacMillan.

To be honest I thought the law viewed the usual disclaimer that any litigation must be undertaken through the preferred country of the site maintainer - so for example Mirror Group would state a UK court should hear a complaint. The second area is that the location of the pages, not the viewing screen, was the factor in what legal juristiction applied, so this is a pebble thrown in the pond.

Perhaps the French are making a heavily delayed case for Minitel to make a comeback?

Juristiction

I think we can argue over whether putting something on the Internet is the same as publishing it in France and if it's the responsibility of French ISPs to block or allow access, o if it's the responsibility of the publisher.

In the end though who cares? The Mirror Group aren't in France and can't be made to pay, so what was the point Isn't this the same as the US trying to prosecute Pirate Bay?

They're not actually going to pay it, are they?

If they do, they must be bonkers!

They must be loving this.

This basically takes care of the Dail Mail editorial for the next month or so.

Another daft judge

I wonder what the judge expects websites to do. Being able to view stuff published outside your legal jurisdiction is pretty much unavoidable on the net.

It *would* be nice if one could *reliably* map an IP address to the legal jurisdiction of the end-user. It would be possible to set up your firewall so that you can only receive stuff sent by people you can sue. (This would pretty much solve the problems of spam and "bad content".)

Still, one can try and I assume that operators around the world are now compiling lists of IP address ranges associated with French ISPs and configuring their servers to block connections.

Man it sucks to be Europe right now

Treaty of Rome, gave people the right to work elsewhere and trade elsewhere.

Decades of extra rights, right to live with your family, right to privacy, right to fair treatment... Decades of growth, good stuff like Euro, Schengen, fixed bank charges for cross border payments... etc.

Brilliant!

But the last two EU Commissions have been about removing rights.... EU arrest warrant let countries attack each others citizens... which is what will happen if they fail to abide by this courts order and pay the French.... secret unchallengable portfolios of information exchanged by police forces....pre-warrant storage of communications info on every citizen with the data retention act...cross border reporting of banks to tell each country the contents of foreign bank accounts... fortress Europe extra border checks and biometrics on everyone, border checks being reintroduced in the guise of customs checks as part of anti-counterfeiting....

What new rights have Europeans citizens gained from the last two EU Commissions? vs What rights have we lost? Imagine what we would lose if Blair become EU Commission President?

I hope the next guy in that seat is from a rich, liberal, free country, who will re-establish all the rights we had before...

/wishful thinking.

Maybe its not where its published...

@ AC

I completely agree.

The privacy of the individual concerned was breached in France so that's where the infringement occurred.

Of course British gutter press should be held liable for obtaining material illegally in another jurisdiction. They're probably just thanking their lucky stars they weren't pursued in the UK where any civil judgment against them would be likely be significantly greater than a few thousand Euro.

However without reading the text of the judgment (I bet it's in French too), I don't know exactly what the courts ruled on.

Internet vs Paper

So, if the story wasn't online at all, but I'd carried a paper over to France, then they could get prosecuted because the paper was viewed in France?

Bonkers..

The crappy little fine probably means that they won't appeal as well, it's the same problem with all the fixed penalties over here - to get proper justice will cost you more than to just pay out the poxy fine.

Very funny

"The big thing is that for the first time the [court] considered that UK publishers are liable for their contents in France since it is viewable here and the UK is a member of the EU"

This would mean that online content providers in every EU country should ensure that their content is legal according to every other EU country.

Best of luck with that. I think that's as feasible as it will be for Martinez is extract a cent from MGN.

French ISPs

Surely responsiblity for making the content available in France lies with the ISPs? Wonder why they're not getting sued.

Actually, it's British courts that have become suppressors of free comment...

Everyone complaining about the role of the French in this case should read:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5ed6d4a2-003d-11dd-825a-000077b07658.html?nclick_check=1

The UK courts have been widely criticised for their permissive attitude to "libel tourism".

UK Courts are just as notorious!

With all the criticisms being made of French and US courts/jurisdiction people seem to be overlooking the inconvenient fact that the UK courts have a notorious worldwide reputation for supporting tenuous libel actions along very similar lines.

People living in glass kettles and all that!

Does all of this mean we get Brittany Back?

Did the UK even get a referendum on joining the EU?

I don't think so, no democratic process in the joinup to the EU.

Anyway I suppose we just start blocking the French on the servers.

Most major sites probably start to need to take this approach quite seriously.

There are certain groups who will never return to your bottom line, and will only cost you, just block them, or include a notice saying not for consumption in France etc.

That way you avoid a lot of liability, and your site only gets used for your target audience. The Net is just the ability to connect many machines together, it is not a requirement, and things work a lot smoother when the traffic coming in, is your target demographic.

@JonB

I don't think that's correct. I think that when the Daily Mail computer deliberately sent the material to France that constituted publication in France, the same as if they'd had a printer run out actual copies of the newspaper for French people.

Conversely, if they publish in the UK and you carry the newspaper to France then they haven't published in France, lacking either knowledge or intention to do so.

Upholding the Law

I've just been watching a French traffic webcam - published on the internet. A very high proportion of the vehicles were being driven down the right hand side of the road. Surely this is illegal in the UK - prosecute the lot of them I say.

@Thomas

Ah yes, I see what you mean..

The guy saying cut off France is right then, there's no way to tell whether you're sending it there or not.

"Did the UK even get a referendum on joining the EU?"

It got better than that — there was a referendum in 1975, two years after the UK joined the European Community (as was), on whether we should withdraw. So people got to actually try the thing before making a decision.

There was a 64.5% turnout, and 67.2% of people voted to stay in.

New information

Well, if as two others have mentioned, the abuse of privacy took place in France by the British gutter press taking photos then I can see the French courts point.

However, that's completely different to what the article implies.

So, what's the truth, come on El Reg get us the facts!

Ridiculous

I fail to see why a British newspaper hosting a British website in UK should give a shit about French laws.

does this mean

does this mean UK courts will be able to arrest French people for posting lolipronz?

Just curious...

maybe you should all calm down, and pay a bit of attention

I agree with AC.

"[....] how the information for the story was obtained. Journalists followed Martinez around Paris and violated his privacy in France. They broke French privacy laws. "

So before (more of) you all start grumping about the internet being a free for all, and that you obviously don't care enough about celebrities privacy being invaded to actually PAY ATTENTION to the article, keep in mind that they were just stupidly trying to break a law. They thought they could get away with it, and I for one am glad they are being held accountable.

Also, in case you haven't noticed, there has been a lot of talk on here about Facebook allowing users to remove info. The data protection act. That is a UK law. Facebook's servers are in America and they still have to follow our laws when they are dealing with someone residing in the UK.

JonB your logic is completely off.

If you took a newspaper into France, probably 10 people at most would see it.

It is not the same as the www.

Furthermore, you were not publishing anything or distributing it widely.

THAT would be an okay comparison..