Privacy Policy

I don’t know if you have been following the progress of the Duchess of Cambridge’s attempts to take legal action against the publication that published topless photographs of her. If you haven’t, then here is a brief summary of what happened. The Duke and Duchess (Prince William and Catherine) went on holiday to Provence where they stayed at the home of their relative, Viscount Linley. This was not meant to be a public stay or visit and Linley’s home is not even on the main road.

However, a photographer seems to have found a place somewhere in the distance from where he could take shots of the royal couple using a very powerful tele-photo lens. We assume that he must have waited for hours to get the pictures he wanted, but he certainly hit pay dirt: shots of Catherine sunbathing topless.

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These pictures were first printed in a French magazine. And then, they began their journey around the world. An Irish paper carried the pictures. They turned up spread over 20 pages in an Italian publication owned by former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who is certainly no stranger to topless women. Then, they were published in a Swedish magazine. Now they are easily accessible on the Internet, available to anyone who wants to check out the royal bosom.

The Cambridges are understandably livid. But there seems to be little that they can do. A French court ruled in their favour and asked the magazine to desist from distributing the issue in question and to hand the pictures to the court. This sounded like a victory but it meant very little. The magazine had already been on sale for days and copies had passed from hand to hand. Moreover, the French publishers said they could not hand over the photographs because they did not have the copyright.

As of this writing, the Cambridges have not even attempted to go the legal route in Ireland, Italy and Sweden. Even if they choose that option, it is not clear how the courts will rule. 
Besides, can you put the genie back in the bottle once it has been released? The pictures are out there and no sooner has a court ruled against one publication than another one, in a different part of the world, will probably carry the same photos.

At one level, the issue of the topless pictures is a personal tragedy and a deep embarrassment for Catherine. But at 
another level, it demonstrates just how impossible it has 
become for anyone, no matter how well-connected (and the eventual heir to the British throne is certainly well-connected), to either protect their privacy or even, once that privacy has been violated, to do anything about it.

On the other hand, those who breach the privacy of public figures can expect to make millions and face no serious 
legal sanctions. Clearly, there is something very wrong with this situation.

The saga of the Catherine photos is important because none of the usual defences offered by the press seem to 
apply in this case. When Princess Diana was chased by 
paparazzi (who eventually drove her to her death), the press was able to claim that she played footsie with the media and tried deliberately to attract attention. In the case of Catherine, she has remained an essentially private person, 
entirely unwilling to engage with the press on any level other than official.

Some years ago, the Duchess of York, William’s aunt, was the target of a similar paparazzi invasion of her privacy. But then, the media were able to claim that not only had the 
Duchess, like Princess Diana, courted the gossip columnists but there was an element of public interest in the revelations. She was photographed in intimate positions with a man who she claimed was her financial advisor and not a lover of any description. The photos gave the lie to this claim.

Because the Catherine episode offers no mitigating circumstances, it should become a test case. We know now that technology makes it impossible to suppress photographs once they have reached the public domain. So, to go down that route is futile. The only answer is to pursue a policy of deterrence. No matter which way you look at it, the photographer who staked out the Linley home in the hope of getting tele-photo shots of the royal couple, set out to breach their privacy.

As there was no overriding public interest involved, what he did was a crime. The civilised nations of the world should get together and agree on a charter that not only treats such invasions of privacy as serious crimes but also lays down 
significant jail sentences (say ten years or so) for those who commit this crime. At present, the identity of the photographer is protected under French law.

I forsee invasions of privacy getting worse as technology 
develops. We can’t fight technology. But we can punish the men and women who use this technology to invade the privacy of individuals. And that is the route we should go down.