"Despite the large number of statutes dealing with privacy, legal regulation of privacy is at best patchy and varies markedly across the jurisdictions in Australia. While there is no common law action for breach of privacy in Australia, privacy interests are protected indicentally by other common law principles, such as tresspass, nuisance, defamation and passing off. The equitable doctrine of confidence is perhaps the most promising potential source of protection for privacy om the unwritten law. Indeed, the House of Lords in Campbell v MGN Ltd has recently transformed the breach of confidence action into a privacy tort in all but name. In doing so, the Law Lords drew explicitly upon the privacy values enshrined in Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, now incorporated into the United Kingdom domestic law, along with the other rights guaranteed under the Convention, by the Human Rights Act 1998 (UK). The Court of Appeal in New Zealand recently took the bold step of recognising a new privacy tort, along the same lines as th United States “privacy facts” tort. It appears likely that Australian courts will also develop the breach of confidence action in order to make it a more effective behicle for obtaioning redress against unauthorised disclosure of private facts by the media. How far the courts will go in this direciton will depend on judicial olicy, and the constraints imposed by the doctrine of precedent."