When publishing content online, one may well be subject to the jurisdiction of many countries other than the country from which you post the material or in which your site is hosted or your business is incorporated. Note the following cautions:
- UK, Australia, Germany, France and Canada claim jurisdiction whenever an article is downloaded from the Internet by someone in their country (note: Due to criticism of this policy, the UK Department of Constitutional Affairs has launched a public consultation into whether this should be changed).
- Risk is greatest when writing about people from these countries, But one UK court allowed suit from someone who was merely well known in the UK (Don King)
- Foreign countries lack First Amendment protection and may lack fair use defense. Many foreign countries also have “moral rights” laws which limit the changes that can be made to others’ creations
- Foreign countries have a less generous concept of “fair use” than US. UK’s “fair dealing” is more narrowly construed, and other jurisdictions provide only specific narrowly drawn exceptions.
- Foreign countries may have more restricted ideas of what constitutes a “public” place, making model releases more advisable even when shooting in streets and parks if you are not covering something highly newsworthy involving public figures. Monaco’s Princess Caroline recently brought a successful claim (upheld by the European Court of Human Rights) against publication that depicted her in public, on the grounds that she was spending time with her children as a private citizen, not doing anything that related to her public role as a princess.
- Foreign defamation standards are often far less friendly to media outlets, and are weighed heavily towards plaintiff interests In this regard please note the section in UK Defamation Law (coming soon).
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