Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's Privacy Lawsuits Could Backfire

As if they didn't have enough on their plates with the royal exit and a transatlantic move, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have also spent 2020 embroiled in a legal battle.
The Sussexes have sued several media outlets in their fight back against tabloids they say invaded Meghan's privacy in pursuit of stories about her.
Amber Melville-Brown, head of the media and reputation practice at international law firm Withers, says the strategy will likely backfire for Harry and Meghan and that the lawsuits will only "make the press even more persistent."

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry have made it clear that they're done being pushed around—especially by the media. Amid their controversial royal exit, the couple has been pursuing lawsuits against several British tabloids and other media outlets, including The Mail on Sunday and The Sun.

The lawsuits haven't gone perfectly so far. In May, Meghan suffered a setback when a judge struck out part of her claim against the Mail on Sunday's publisher Associated Newspapers and in July, she agreed to pay almost $90,000 in legal fees as a result of the loss. Although Harry and Meghan have yet to give up their fight, at least one expert is speaking out against their legal action.

"Their attempt to control the British tabloids was misjudged in my view," Amber Melville-Brown, head of the media and reputation practice at international law firm Withers, told Insider. "As a privacy lawyer I value and will fight for the rights of my clients. But I fear that here, even if Meghan wins her legal case in her claims for misuse of private information, and infringement of her rights under the Data Protection legislation and in copyright, this is a war that she cannot win."

Worse than simply losing the legal fight, Melville-Brown predicts that the lawsuits could backfire and "make the press even more persistent. Obviously, this would be the exact opposite of what Harry and Meghan want, particularly as they attempt to settle into a new, more private life with their one-year-old son, Archie Harrison.

Kayleigh Roberts is a freelance writer and editor with over 10 years of professional experience covering entertainment of all genres, from new movie and TV releases to nostalgia, and celebrity news. Her byline has appeared in Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, ELLE, Harper’s Bazaar, The Atlantic, Allure, Entertainment Weekly, MTV, Bustle, Refinery29, Girls’ Life Magazine, Just Jared, and Tiger Beat, among other publications. She's a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.

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