AV News 178 - November 2009
In Scotland, harassment itself is not a criminal offence, but the victim can ask
the court for a "non-harassment order" against the person who is harassing
him. Breach of the order is a criminal offence. In addition, a person who
harasses another might be charged with breach of the peace, which is a
crime in Scotland. Breach of the peace, unlike harassment, requires only a
single incident.
The law surrounding invasion of privacy has developed rapidly in recent
years. Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights gives
everyone the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his
correspondence. The Convention rights are taken into account by the UK
courts in determining any cases that come before them. As this area of the
law is changing and developing, it is hard to be certain about what will and
what will not amount to an infringement of Article 8.
The use of a long lens to take a photo of someone in a private place, such
as their home, without their consent, is an invasion of privacy even though
the photo is taken from a public place.
For images of people in public places, the key seems to be whether the
place is one where a person would have a reasonable expectation of privacy
and the courts have greatly extended the areas where this might be the case.
A court has held that the right of privacy of a child might be infringed by the
taking and publishing of a photograph of him with his parents in a public
street. Privacy actions in the UK have been concerned with publication rather
than simply the taking of a photograph, but a recent decision of the ECHR
suggest that simply taking a photograph may, in some circumstances,
infringe the right. Photographers are therefore advised to be careful when
taking photographs intended for some kind of publication, even when the
subject is in a public place. Photographs taken of people at public events are
probably still permissible, at least for the present. The general advice is to get
consent and preferably written consent, wherever possible. Failure to obtain
a signed model release will certainly impair the commercial use of an image,
because many photo libraries, stock agencies and the like will not accept an
image of a recognisable person without a release.
Photographs of people may also be subject to the Data Protection Act,
which controls the "processing" of "personal data", that is, data relating to an
individual and from which the individual can be identified. There has not yet
been a court case that has determined whether or not an image of a person,
without any other identifying information, would be caught by the Act, so
photographers should be aware of the possibility. The Ac Ё