International Approach
Download as a PDF
Increasingly businesses and individuals are using their rights under English law to defend their reputations against damaging allegations published internationally and online.
But when you think of a traditional libel complaint brought in England, you could be forgiven for thinking of a UK-registered company or English-based individuals pursuing an English national newspaper. But the law legitimately offers protection to all those whose reputations have been damaged in this country, be it over press articles, critical websites, damaging items on blogs or even forum postings.
There are three common misconceptions about when you are entitled to bring a complaint under English law - that the information has to be published in hard copy form in the UK, that the information has to be published widely and that the information has to be published in English. This ignores the reality of dealing with damaging allegations in today’s media environment.
To take the idea that hard copies of the allegations must be published, it is established law now that information published on the internet is deemed to be published in England and Wales (and so subject to English law) if an internet user accesses it from this country – even if the publisher and servers are located overseas, in Europe, the US or beyond. And this material does not even have to be in English – a recent case saw a prominent Albanian journalist who lives and works in the UK sue a newspaper written in Albanian and published in Switzerland because it had been sold to the Albanian community in the UK, damaging his reputation in this country.
In all of these cases the courts look at the damage caused by the allegations, not necessarily how many people saw them. Schillings recently successfully sued a Danish language newspaper over allegations about an Icelandic bank which were made in articles on their website, hosted in Denmark, which were only read by a handful of people in the UK. However in that case it happened that those who read it were influential investors in the company and other senior officials, meaning that the article had caused serious damage to the company.
- English law is more favourable to those who have been libelled than the laws of many other countries
- There does not have to be a hard copy published in England - if it's online and read in England it counts too
- The allegations do not have to be widely published - they just have to be damaging to the claimant’s reputation
- The article doesn't even have to be written in English
- Vindication through the English legal system can help correct the public record worldwide
The courts will not entertain frivolous claims, and they have been quick to dismiss cases where publication was very insignificant and it cannot be shown to have caused harm to the reputation of those raising complaints. But the law does allow complaints over internet media and blog articles read in England or foreign newspapers sold in this country where they have resulted in damage to a reputation. And the benefit of bringing a complaint in England is that the libel laws offer a greater degree of protection than those in many other jurisdictions, not to mention the general level of respect for English legal process around the world.
Of course on most occasions complaints do not result in lengthy legal proceedings, as the argument can often be won earlier in the complaint.
But whether the case settles early or is won at trial, there are many benefits to vindicating a reputation in the UK. The central tenet of any
victory is remedying the damage caused and refuting the allegations published. This can either be achieved by obtaining a judgment of an
English court rebutting the allegations or by achieving a suitable and prominent apology. In many settlements negotiated by Schillings, this involves the publisher attending Court for the reading of a pre-agreed statement in which they apologise for the damage caused.
Such victories bring with them immense PR benefits too – together with our clients’ PR teams we are able to make capital out of the victory and generate press coverage which brings the vindication to the attention of those who could have seen the original article.
And it is here that the true international benefit of protecting a reputation in the English courts is seen, because once the press release is issued to the major newswires we regularly see the vindication reported in other countries around the world where our client has a reputation too, with these articles remaining accessible through press and internet archives, permanently correcting the public record. The law legitimately offers protection to all those whose reputations have been damaged in this country