Former motorsport chief Max Mosley has failed in his bid to to impose a legal duty of “prior notification” on the press. Mosley brought a case in front of the European Court of Human Rights after UK newspaper the News of the World published details of his sex life.
Victory for Mosley would have meant that media outlets would have been required to contact subjects of stories prior to publication. But there were fears that such a step would lead to a rise in interim injunctions barring publication.
In a ruling published this morning, the Strasbourg court judges noted that:
having regard to the chilling effect to which a pre-notification requirement risks giving rise, to the significant doubts as to the effectiveness of any pre-notification requirement and to the wide margin of appreciation in this area, the Court is of the view that Article 8 [the right to privacy] does not require a legally binding pre-notification requirement.
