Nicci

Is a magazine (of national distribution) allowed to print your full name, address without your permission, with references to you owning an item of value?

This has happened very recently. An apology has been received from the editor of the magazine, but I am alarmed that this happened in the first place.

Living in more fear than usual of being burgled is not very nice.

john_s

iTrader: (1)

Doesn't sound good

I think I'd be considering taking legal advice if I were you.

I think most legal bods will give you 30 minutes free to see if you have a case.

John.

Apparition

Quite honestly, I wouldn't be telling a magazine/ newspaper that I owned an item of value, and ...did you read the small print ?

Nicci

I didn't tell them.

It was done without my knowledge.

letdown

What you really mean is can I get any money out of this !

Phone claims Direct or whatever they are called.

Nicci

Not bothered about the money, but can magazines get pulled from the shelves?

Brendan Hughes

Get them to print a correction. "When we said "Camberley" last week, we meant "Camden".

rik1471

What item did they print about?

fast bloke

I think you would need a fully monitored alarm system with CCTV now. As the editor if they will pay for it

Brendan Hughes

More seriously, if you've received an apology, that already suggests they admit to doing something wrong. I certainly would take legal advice, though don't go overboard - your "living in fear" might possibly earn you a grand or two in compensation, but not much more. And the lawyers will suck that up, if it's not CAB.

Is there a magazines/publishing regulatory body you can contact? From what you've said, it does sound like a remarkable error on their part.

The other thing is obviously to act pronto to minimise the damage and the threat, which is why my correction comment above was only partly tongue in cheek.

ChrisB

Brendan's comments sound sensible to me.

I'd also move the item somewhere else (if possible and if you haven't already)...

RS2 JIM

iTrader: (5)

Same thing happened to my grandmother and father in the Sunday Times recently (within the last year). They spotted her home for sale and took an interest. Their features writer contacted her and asked if she'd allow them to write a piece about the history of the house etc. She agreed as as it would be nice publicity for the house and help it sell. The article they wrote was excellent but they included a list of my fathers collection of classic cars stored at the address without asking us! The worst bit was that they had the name of the house in full view in one of the pics and had mentioned the tiny village in Scotland that the house is in. It wouldn't have taken a rocket scientist to have worked out how to get hold of the cars!

Anyway, action was taken against the paper and after a mutually agreed settlement covering the costs of moving the vehicles to a new safehouse no further action was taken.

However, it just goes to show how easy a mistake it is for an article writer to make. They're only thinking of what makes their piece more interesting and seldom of the people concerned within the article.

I would consult with your insurance firm if the item is individually insured as they may well see this as an advertisement for someone to steal the item. My fathers insurance brokers certainly felt that way and insisted that the cars were not insured until re-located.

I hope it all works out for you.

James

The Zohan

Yep, spot on Brendan!

DannyBoyTurbo

Luckily they got my address wrong else I would've been very pi$$ed off.

Jerome

As well as the above advice, I would want to know how they found out. Finding out who told them you have an item of value, and where you live, should help prevent this happening again.

Nicci

Jerome. The editor paid for the information and I have a very good idea who from.

Thanks everyone for the useful advice.

GC8

Youll need an injunction in order to have copies removed from sale; and thatll cost you A LOT of money. The Hight Court is the preserve of the wealthy Im afraid.


Simon

r32

Invasion of privacy I think its called, go see a good solicitor, its unlikely that the copies would be pulled but a wad of notes might help soften the anger a little .......
Do it now....