Lonzim Plc v Sprague
[2009] EWHC 2838
December 10 2009
In Lonzim PLC v Andrew Sprague, the High Court has dismissed an online defamation claim on the basis that there was no substantial publication of the words complained of.
Facts
… The evidence was that the online edition of the article had been visited 65 times. It was not apparent whether that was 65 different people or the same people accessing the article more than once. Nor was it possible to say in which jurisdiction the visitors were located. The evidence was that, on average, approximately 6.79% of the visits to the Financial Mail website were made by users of the Internet in the UK. 6.79% of 65 visits meant that 4 visits may have been made by one or more visitors based in the UK.
Decision
Mr Justice Tugendhat in the High Court applied the principle in Al Amoudi v Brisard, that there is no presumption in law that placing material on the Internet automatically leads to a substantial publication of it. He found that whether or not any person in the UK had read the words complained of in the Financial Mail was a matter of speculation and no more. L had not, therefore, successfully shown that there had been substantial publication of the article in the UK. Taken at its highest, there was evidence at best of minimal publication of the words complained of and certainly not evidence of any substantial tort committed within the jurisdiction…