Consent and consequences in the digital age

Author and lawyer Emma Sadleir is one of the country’s leading social media legal experts. Founder of The Digital Law Company, she’s the first point of call for anyone who’s in a bit of trouble as a result of misusing social media.

- Emma Sadleir

GQ: What inspired you to create The Digital Law Company? Emma Sadleir:

I was at a big law firm working in media law just as the social media revolution was erupting and I saw a gap in the market for a specialist in social media. There were a couple of cases that really made me realise that I needed to create something in this space

A young woman had been surreptitiously filmed having sex by her ex-boyfriend. He was ostensibly playing music using his laptop but was actually recording her – in such a calculated way that his face was out of the shot. Six months after they broke up he uploaded the video onto a whole lot of porn-sharing sites, tagging her identity. I’m afraid it’s so common now, but back then I was absolutely horrified and really wanted to help her. A parent whose son had created a spoof Twitter account in the name of his high-school principal also contacted me. It was a typical schoolboy prank but he was expelled from school on the cusp of his final exams.

There was a need for education and crisis management – I realised that people were clueless about how badly things could go wrong and that there were actual laws that could help and protect people. I left the big law firm, cashed in my provident fund and started on my own. It was just right time, right place!

GQ: What types of cases do you usually deal with?

ES: Harassment, cyberbulling, hate speech, crimen injuria, revenge pornography, ‘sextortion’, image-based violence, defamation, privacy infringements, employment law, social media grooming, identity theft, reputation management, crisis management, and intellectual property issues.

GQ: There have been many discussions about the dangers of social media posts and how it could affect your hiring potential – legally, can companies use your social media posts against you?