Revisiting the public disclosure of private facts in cyberworld

Abstract

Traditional jurisprudence holds that a person who posts private information onto a social networking website does not have a legitimate expectation of privacy, however online social networking has revolutionised the way people communicate and share information with one another. This article considers ways in which a person could have a legitimate expectation of privacy on the internet by attempting to answer questions such as whether privacy can exist where there is no physical space or inherently private subject matter, secrecy or seclusion and, more pertinently, whether the established jurisprudence can be applied within the phenomenon of social networking sites.