NI High Court: £300,000 award in Tattle Life proceedings is set aside

About this case:

• Citation:
  [2026] NIKB 20
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  NI High Court
• Judge:
  Mr Justice Michael Humphreys

Delivering judgment for the High Court, Mr Justice Michael Humphreys found that in light of repeated failures to disclose material information in ex parte applications and the improper service of the proceedings, the plaintiffs’ award and other orders granted in their favour must be set aside.

Gavin Millar KC and Peter Girvan appeared for the plaintiffs/respondents instructed by Gateley Legal, and Tony McGleenan KC and David Mitchell appeared for the first and third defendants/applicants instructed by Mills Selig.

Background

The plaintiffs, an entrepreneur and a businesswoman who enjoyed an extensive online presence, commenced proceedings in 2023 seeking damages and other relief in connection with material published on the gossip website ‘Tattle Life’, which they alleged amounted to defamation, a breach of their data rights, harassment and misuse of private information.

The first defendant was the founder of the website. The second defendant was a company connected to the first defendant. The third defendant was the owner and operator of the website. The defendants were originally named in the proceedings as “persons unknown operating under the pseudonym ‘Tattle Life’”.

On 23 June 2023, the plaintiffs ex parte obtained orders permitting them to issue proceedings in anonymised form, and granting substituted service of the writ and statement of claim by email. A reporting restriction order and a Norwich Pharmacal order was also made.

In September 2023, the plaintiffs secured judgment in default of appearance and in default of defence as against the defendants and in December 2023, damages were assessed in the sum of £300,000, together with costs.

The plaintiffs subsequently obtained further orders ex parte granting inter alia a worldwide freezing order over £1.8 million of the defendants’ assets, a further Norwich Pharmacal order requiring some 26 companies to deliver information in relation to the identity of the operators of Tattle Life, a Bankers Trust order, and substituting the three named defendant for the previous “persons unknown”.

The first and third defendants entered an appearance and sought orders striking out the proceedings as an abuse of process, setting aside the court’s order for substituted service, and an order setting aside service of the write of summons and/or staying the proceedings.

The plaintiffs applied for orders deeming the service of the proceedings and documents of record good, a subpoena compelling the first defendant to attend to give evidence, and discovery in relation to the email account “tattlelife@hotmail.com”.

The High Court

Having regard to Canada Goose v Persons Unknown [2020] EWCA Civ 303, Mr Justice Humphreys recognised that it may be appropriate, “in exceptional cases” for proceedings to issue against “persons unknown” where a person’s identity is unknown and is readily identifiable as a defendant to the claim.

Noting that “a litigant does not need the court’s permission to issue proceedings against persons unknown although it may require the intervention of the court to ensure effective service, and the court will always closely supervise such litigation”, the judge considered that the plaintiff’s solicitor accepted that he ought to have provided information about the identification of Mr Bond during the course of the 2023 ex parte hearings and had not done so where he was acting under a number of misunderstandings.

In the circumstances, and in circumstances where the plaintiffs argued that judgment had already been entered as against the defendants and so the court could not strike out the action, the court refused to strike out the action and moved to consider the issue of material non-disclosure.

Mr Justice Humphreys considered that the plaintiffs had not informed the court on the first ex parte application that work had been carried out by a investigations company and that Mr Bond had been identified.

The judge explained that “had the court been informed as it ought to have been, the inescapable conclusion is that it would have directed service of proceedings in the conventional manner on Sebastian Bond by first class post at his known address in Poole and, in all likelihood, by use of the multiple email addresses which had been identified through the research carried out” and was satisfied that the substituted service order would not have been made.

The court also pointed out the obligation on a plaintiff to return to court if there has been some material non-disclosure or if fresh information comes to light, noting that a number of material developments had occurred which had not been brought to the attention of the court during the second ex parte application for judgment in default.

Mr Justice Humphreys opined: “Had the court been informed of the position in relation to Mimecast documents, the state of knowledge in relation to Sebastian Bond, the alternative email addresses and the postal address for him, it would have taken steps to join him as a named defendant and make directions in relation to service.”

Further highlighting that the application to enter judgment against the defendants had not been properly served, as the substituted service order permitting service by email related only to the service of the writ and statement of claim, and that there had been further developments in relation to inter alia the identification of Mr Bond had not been notified to the court, Mr Justice Humphreys was satisfied that the court would not have made the order of December 2023.

The judge also took issue with inter alia the failure on part of the plaintiffs to disclose during the course of their subsequent application for a worldwide freezing order that information from one of their investigation reports clearly linking Mr Bond, Yuzu Zest Limited and the website was known to them at the time of their application to enter judgment in default.

Weighing up the litigation advantage which accrued to the plaintiffs by virtue of “these manifold material non-disclosures” against the “windfall which may benefit the defendants in the event that orders are set aside”, the court determined that the substituted service order ought to be set aside.

As to whether the proceedings had been properly served in accordance with the substituted service order, Mr Justice Humphreys accepted that in appropriate circumstances, service by way of file-sharing link may be effective when a substituted service order is made for service by email.

The court continued: “It is, however, an entirely different process from sending documents by way of email attachment. Software such as Mimecast provides the user with information as to when the documents have been downloaded and when the relevant link expires. It must be incumbent on a plaintiff who seeks to depart from the normal modes of service to inform the court in the event that the proceedings were not downloaded”.

Mr Justice Humphreys concluded that in circumstances where the plaintiffs knew that no Mimecast access code had been requested by the defendants and therefore, that the documents had not been seen, the proceedings had not been served in compliance with the substituted service order.

The court also refused to deem the service of the proceedings and of the application for judgment in default good where “the solicitors were at all times able to confirm whether or not any documents sent by this means had been accessed, seen or downloaded” and where “No explanation has been provided by the plaintiffs’ solicitors for the defective service of the application to enter judgment”.

As to the plaintiffs’ remaining applications, Mr Justice Humphreys determined that compelling the production of further documentation, “with the inevitable additional cost and consequent delay”, was “simply not necessary within the rubric of Order 24 rule 9 of the Rules” and considered that it would neither be necessary nor proportionate to issue a subpoena in order that the applications could be heard and determined.

Conclusion

Accordingly, the High Court dismissed the application to strike the proceedings out as an abuse of process, set aside the order for substituted service made on 23 June 2023, declared that the writ had not been served on the first and third defendants, and dismissed the plaintiffs’ applications to deem service good, the discovery application and their application for leave to serve a subpoena.

In circumstances where the proceedings were not properly served, the judgment against the first and third defendants and the worldwide freezing order were also set aside.

Sands & Anor v Bond & Ors [2026] NIKB 20