Criminalising privacy in the digital age: The reasonable expectation of not being digitally monitored.

In this essay, we try to present a case for having a general privacy offence. Privacy is about much more than voyeurism involving sexual exploitation. The recent offence of upskirting is too narrow to protect the broader set of privacy interests that exist in plural societies. Current technology means it is all too easy for the masses not only to spy, but to keep digital records of information that belongs to others including their images, voices and correspondence. We shall try to demonstrate that private acts and information that are revealed in an ephemeral sense in a public place should not be put in permanent form and a fortiori should not be published online or in hardcopy. It will be argued that publishing such information without consent or lawful justification is sufficiently harmful to justify making it a crime. It shall be submitted that while human rights law, data protection law and tort law recognise the wrongful harm in privacy violations, the protection offered by these bodies of laws is limited, because they rely on expensive civil litigation that is out of the reach of most. Billionaires can pay for nondisclosure agreements to keep misconduct (such as bullying and sexual harassment) out of the news, but many people with genuine privacy claims cannot afford to seek compensation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]