Blogging Anonymity

June 20, 2009

‘Night Jack’ is a police detective who wrote a blog about his work and the problems on the streets. The Times were to publish a story revealing his real identity and the blogger sought an injunction to protect his privacy.

 

He failed to establish his claim, based on his right to privacy and the public interest. The case was widely covered in the national press and has received considerable coverage on the Internet, where it has caused some consternation.

 

Mr Justice Eady found that blogging was a public activity, and thus no reasonable expectation of privacy arose. He also took the view that, far from there being a public interest in anonymity, there was a public interest in knowing the true source of the blog posts. The full judgment rejecting his claim is now available on BAILII: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/QB/2009/1358.html