Legal Case Summary
Malone v Metropolitan Police Commissioner [1979] Ch 344
Telephone tapping – Unlawful interception
Facts
Malone (M) was charged with handling stolen property. During the Crown Court prosecution of M, the prosecution admitted that the Post Office (P) had intercepted M’s telephone conversations under the authority of the Secretary of State for use by the police. M sought declarations against the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis that such conduct was unlawful and for an injunction against the Metropolitan Police Commissioner (D) to restrain interception of his telephone conversations.
Issue
The issue in question was whether the telephone tapping by P by means of recording telephone conversations from wires which, though connected to the subscriber’s premises, are not on them, is unlawful under English law.
Decision / Outcome
There was no right of property in words transmitted over a telephone apart from copyright, nor was there a right to privacy on the telephone in English law. The court also found that P was not contractually bound to confidentiality. Moreover, it was not D, the defendant, who had intercepted the conversations, it was P, and no unlawful conduct could be established as there was no law against the Post Office tapping telephones by means of recording from wires which were not on the subscriber’s premises. M’s declaration was refused. This case later came before the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Malone v. The United Kingdom (1984) 7 EHRR 14 which held that the interception was an ‘interference by a public authority’ with the right to private life, the scope and clarity of the exercise of this power being unclear under English law.
Updated 19 March 2026
This case summary remains accurate as a description of the 1979 domestic decision and the subsequent European Court of Human Rights ruling in Malone v United Kingdom (1984) 7 EHRR 14. However, readers should be aware of significant subsequent legal developments. The inadequacy of English law identified in the ECtHR judgment led directly to the Interception of Communications Act 1985, which placed telephone interception on a statutory footing for the first time. That Act was later replaced by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA), which substantially expanded the regulatory framework. Most recently, the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 further overhauled the law governing interception and surveillance, consolidating and extending earlier provisions. The 2016 Act is now the primary legislation governing lawful interception in the UK. The article’s legal history is therefore accurate, but the broader legal context has changed very substantially since 1979 and even since 2000. Additionally, since the UK’s departure from the EU, the Human Rights Act 1998 (which incorporated the European Convention on Human Rights into domestic law) remains in force, though its future has periodically been the subject of political debate. The right to respect for private life is now protected domestically under Article 8 ECHR as given effect by the HRA 1998, which was not available at the time of the original Malone litigation.
