Banks loses libel action
The founder of Leave.EU, Arron Banks, has lost his High Court libel action against journalist Carole Cadwalladr
Banks had brought the action against the journalist for two specific instances in 2019 - one a tweet and one a TED talk - where Cadwalladr had commented on his relationship with the Russian state and its attempts to interfere in the Brexit referendum and the US election in 2016.
The judgement of the court was that the tweet did not meet the threshold for causing serious harm to Mr Banks's reputation. The TED talk, which has been viewed more than 5 million times, did meet that threshold of harm. However, the court accepted Cadwalladrs defence, which was that "her belief that publishing the TED talk was in the public interest was reasonable."
In her written judgement, Mrs Justice Steyn said:
"I accept the TED talk was political expression of high importance, and great public interest (in the strictest sense), not only in this country but worldwide."
Cambridge Analytica
Cadwalladr's reporting on Russian interference in the democratic processes of the UK and US uncovered the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The revelations that Meta - then Facebook - was allowing the data of tens of millions of its users to be harvested so they could be targeted with political content resulted in Mark Zuckerberg being hauled in front of Congress and fines from the ICO in the UK and the Federal Trade Commission in the US.
The scandal continues to rain on Zuckerberg's parade with whistle blowers like Frances Haugen shining a light on some of the murkier aspects of Facebook's operations. A rebrand hasn't stopped the lawsuits. In May 2022 Washington DC Attorney General filed a lawsuit accusing Zuckerberg of personal involvement in the data scandal.
For her part in exposing the scandal, Cadwalladr has been subjected to sustained personal abuse and trolling. In 2017, when The Observer published Cadwalladr's first article about Cambridge Analytica, Banks's Leave.EU tweeted a video showing Cadwalladr being assaulted. The gendered and misogynistic abuse aimed at Cadwalladr hasn't let up since, and its purpose is to humiliate, intimidate and discredit her work - to shut her up. In contrast to Banks, and others like him who have London's top libel lawyers on speed dial, Cadwalladr had no legal recourse to challenge those subjecting her to such treatment.
Today's verdict is an important one for freedom of speech and the work undertaken by investigative reporters in the public interest. Had Cadwalladr lost she would have likely been bankrupted - and silenced. Banks tweeted that he was likely to appeal.
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