ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on some areas that have come to be of particular concern in recent years because they involve either new legislation, or new or worrying developments in the way they have been applied to journalism. In 2013 a new Defamation Act was passed that gave journalists greater protection from being sued for libel. The Data Protection Act (DPA) is one of the most misunderstood pieces of legislation on the statute book, particularly as it applies to journalism. For example, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) in May 1999 issued guidelines that names of victims and witnesses of road crashes or other accidents were entitled not to have personal details released without their permission. Operation motorman was not a police investigation, but an investigation by the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) into data being acquired by newspaper organisations in pursuit of stories.
