The topic of privacy has many aspects. In some instances, especially where well-known figures are involved, it relates to the legal ability to stop the bringing of information about their private lives into a more public arena. For most people, it involves the ability to go about everyday life without having details of movements and actions recorded and analysed to form the basis for further actions relating to them. In some cases, this may appear relatively harmless. Most people are familiar with the notion of web advertising targeted by reference to a user’s browsing history but there have been more potentially threatening applications ranging from the use of automated facial recognition systems to monitor activity in public spaces to the oft cited use of Facebook data for political purposes as seen in the 2016 US Presidential election. More and more actions are recorded, processed and used as the basis for action that affects the individual concerned. Whether this is a force for good or ill is something that can be debated. What is clear is that informational surveillance will impact very significantly upon debates as to the nature of the societies that we wish to live in.
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Michael O’Flaherty
This chapter examines the human rights protections afforded to sexual minorities. It shows that the jurisprudence focuses on issues of non-discrimination and privacy, and that important human rights protections can also be derived from the range of other civil, political, economic, social, and cultural human rights of general application. The chapter examines a recent exercise in the clarification of the application of human rights law concerning issues of sexual orientation and gender identity: the Yogyakarta Principles.
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Michael O’Flaherty
This chapter examines the human rights protections afforded to sexual and gender minorities. It shows that the jurisprudence focuses on issues of non-discrimination and privacy, and that important human rights protections can also be derived from the range of other civil, political, economic, social, and cultural human rights of general application. The chapter examines a recent exercise in the clarification of the application of human rights law concerning issues of sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics: the Yogyakarta Principles.
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This chapter examines how data flows are managed by the General Data Protection Regulation. Strict rules of equivalency manage transfers for non-EEA states and recent challenges to agreed data equivalency rulings, in particular, in the case of Maximillian Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner decision have proven challenging for regulators. This chapter will examine these challenges and what GDPR says is permissible and what is not in relation to transfers to third countries. In addition to the Schrems decision, the chapter also examines the more recent Digital Rights Ireland Ltd v European Commission and Data Protection Commissioner v Facebook Ireland Ltd and Maximillian Schrems cases.
Book
Christian Witting
Street on Torts provides a wide-ranging overview, and a clear and accurate explanation of tort law. The book consists of nine parts. Part I provides an introduction to the subject, including examination of protected interests in tort and the history of this branch of law beginning with the ancient trespass torts. Part II looks at negligent infringements of the person, property and financial interests, as well as examining the liability in negligence of public authorities. Part III looks at intentional invasions of interests in the person and property. Part IV looks at misrepresentation-based and general economic torts. Part V is about torts of strict or stricter liability (that is, where fault plays either no part or a lesser part in liability decisions) and includes consideration of nuisance and product liability. Part VI considers interests in reputation (ie defamation). Part VII is about actions in privacy. Part VIII looks at the misuse of process and public powers. The final part, Part IX, is about vicarious liability, parties, and remedies.
Book
Kirsty Horsey and Erika Rackley
Kidner’s Casebook on Torts provides a comprehensive, portable library of the leading cases in the field. It presents a wide range of carefully edited extracts, which illustrate the essence and reasoning behind each decision made. Concise author commentary focuses the reader on the key elements within the extracts. Statutory materials are also included where they are necessary to understand the subject. The book examines the tort of negligence including chapters on the basic principles of duty of care, omissions and acts of third parties, the liability of public bodies, psychiatric harm, economic loss, breach of duty, causation and remoteness of damage and defences. It goes on to consider three special liability regimes—occupiers’ liability, product liability and breach of statutory duty—before turning to discussion of the personal torts and land torts. It concludes with chapters on vicarious liability and damages.
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All books in this flagship series contain carefully selected substantial extracts from key cases, legislation, and academic debate, providing able students with a stand-alone resource. This chapter examines the protection of privacy, personality, and publicity interests. It considers: the law of privacy and the extent to which individuals can control the use or disclosure of their personal and private information; character and personality merchandising and the ways in which the law of registered and unregistered trade marks protects these interests; and the controversial question of whether individuals can and should be able to prevent the commercial exploitation of their personality and image through a separate publicity right.
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L. Bently, B. Sherman, D. Gangjee, and P. Johnson
This chapter examines the tort of misuse of private information. It begins by considering the sort of information that can be considered private, before moving on to examining the test for whether there is a reasonable expectation of privacy over such information before, finally, looking at the ‘ultimate balancing test’ that is the balancing of rights under Article 8 and 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights.
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L. Bently, B. Sherman, D. Gangjee, and P. Johnson
This chapter examines the tort of misuse of private information. It begins by considering the sort of information that can be considered private. It then moves on to examining the test for whether there is a reasonable expectation of privacy over such information. The chapter looks at the ‘ultimate balancing test’ that is the balancing of rights under Articles 8 and 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights and concludes by touching on reform.
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This chapter discusses different aspects of privacy. It shows that there is no general common law right to protection from invasion of privacy (the so-called ‘right to be let alone’), but that limitation has been largely subverted by the new law in the second section on the protection of personal information and the reasonable expectation of privacy that has developed significantly in recent years. This shows the potential power of the Human Rights Act 1998 and the European Convention on Human Rights, and is the subject of considerable controversy, especially in relation to the protection of celebrity privacy. The final section considers remedies in privacy cases.
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All books in this flagship series contain carefully selected substantial extracts from key cases, legislation, and academic debate, providing students with a stand-alone resource. This chapter examines the regulation of access to genetic information. It first discusses various third parties’ interests in genetic test results and DNA profiles, and the extent to which genetic privacy is protected by the law. The chapter then considers the issue of whether genetic discrimination should be treated in the same way as other illegitimate discriminatory practices and also discusses recent developments in the field of genetics, namely direct-to-consumer genetic testing and pharmacogenetics.
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This chapter assesses moral rights. From a human rights perspective, the distinction between economic and moral rights can be traced back to Art. 27(2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The protection of the moral interests of the authors finds justification not only in the context of human rights but also under a special set of copyright rules that offer protection to non-pecuniary interests of the authors. The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CPDA) recognises four main moral rights: the right to be identified as the author or director of a work (this is the so-called paternity right); the right to object to derogatory treatment of a work (the so-called integrity right); the right to object to a false attribution of authorship in the case of a literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic work or a film; and the right of privacy in commissioned photographs and films.
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Course-focused and comprehensive, the Textbook on series provide an accessible overview of the key areas on the law curriculum. This chapter examines Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which protects the right to respect for a person’s private and family life, home, and correspondence. It begins by looking at some general issues, and then focuses on police powers of entry, search, and seizure; and the privacy rights of the individual as against the press.
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This chapter examines the regulation of access to genetic information. It first discusses third parties’ interests in genetic test results, and the extent to which genetic privacy is protected by the law. It considers whether genetic discrimination should be treated in the same way as other types of discrimination and discusses developments in the field of genetics, including direct-to-consumer genetic testing and pharmacogenetics.
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This chapter provides a case study of some of the implications in international human rights law of the SARS-CoV-2 COVID-19 pandemic, considering positive obligations on States and obligations to work together, as well as a range of rights and freedoms including the right to the highest attainable standard of health, right to privacy, family rights, and freedom of movement. In contrast to earlier chapters which focused on one right/freedom or groups of rights holders, this chapter demonstrates the complexities of human rights in reality by overviewing some of the rights and freedoms engaged by the acts and omissions of governments responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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This chapter explains the moral rights of the author in a copyright context. Moral rights emphasize the strong link between the work and its author. That link prevails regardless of the how the commercial exploitation of the work takes place. There are two core moral rights. First, there is the right to be identified, or the paternity right. This applies traditionally to literary, dramatic, musical, or artistic works, but it has been expanded to include films and performances. Second, there is the right of integrity, or the right to object to derogatory treatment of the work. This protects the reputation of the author, which again also has its value for users of the work. The discussion also includes the right against false attribution of the work; the right to privacy in relation to commissioned photographs; and consent and waiver.
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The right of privacy under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights was incorporated into English law by the Human Rights Act 1998, but English law as yet recognises no tort of invasion of privacy as such. Admittedly, a number of specific torts protect particular aspects of privacy, but this protection may be regarded as haphazard, incidental, and incomplete. Recent decisions, however, have seen substantial developments in the protection given to particular privacy interests, above all by adapting the law of breach of confidence to provide a remedy against the unauthorised disclosure of personal information. These issues are discussed in this chapter.
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This chapter examines data protection, digitization of data, its implications for personal privacy, and the regulation of data industries. It begins by discussing the current law found in the General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018. It examines the key concepts of data controllers, data processors, and data subjects, and discusses the conditions for the processing of personal data. This includes an examination of key cases such as Nowak v Data Protection Commissioner and Bodil Lindqvist. It looks at the geographical scope of the GDPR and the extraterritorial effect of the Regulation, and examines the domestic purposes exemption after Ryneš.
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This chapter examines the nature of free speech, first addressing the question of why free speech must be protected. It then discusses Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), media freedom, defamation, criminal offences, privacy, and official secrecy.
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G. T. Laurie, S. H. E. Harmon, and E. S. Dove
This chapter discusses the nature of genetic disease and the role of the genetic counsellor in handling personal and familial genetic information; legal and ethical responses to the ‘familial’ nature of genetics; individual and family interests in genetic information; other parties’ interests in genetic information; state interest in genetic information; gene therapy; and cloning.
