SLAPPs Are Rising

In recent years, wealthy individuals and corporations have increasingly turned to the courts not to seek justice, but to silence journalists. Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation — known as SLAPPs — use the threat of expensive, protracted litigation to intimidate reporters, publishers, and campaigners into dropping stories that are clearly in the public interest. For UK journalists, understanding the SLAPP threat is now essential.

What Is a SLAPP?

A SLAPP is a legal action — typically a defamation claim, a privacy claim, or a data protection complaint — that is brought not with the genuine intention of vindicating a legal right, but with the primary aim of silencing criticism or investigative journalism. The defining characteristics of a SLAPP include:

• Disproportionate resources: The claimant typically has far greater financial resources than the defendant, creating a fundamental power imbalance.
• Intimidatory conduct: Aggressive legal letters, threats of enormous damages claims, and instructions to "cease and desist" are designed to frighten rather than to resolve a genuine dispute.
• Targeting public interest journalism: The underlying story almost always concerns matters of legitimate public concern — corruption, fraud, environmental damage, or abuse of power.
• Abuse of process: The legal action is used as a weapon rather than a legitimate pursuit of justice. The claimant often has little interest in actually going to trial — the threat itself is the weapon.

The Scale of the Problem in the UK

The UK has become known internationally as a jurisdiction of choice for SLAPPs, particularly in defamation cases. London's reputation as a centre for "libel tourism" has diminished somewhat since the Defamation Act 2013 introduced a "serious harm" requirement, but the problem persists. Research by the Foreign Policy Centre found that SLAPP threats against UK journalists and publishers increased significantly between 2020 and 2025.

High-profile cases have involved oligarchs suing investigative journalists, corporations threatening environmental campaigners, and property developers targeting local reporters. In many cases, the journalist or publisher has been forced to withdraw stories, accept restrictive settlements, or spend years fighting costly legal battles.

How SLAPPs Harm Journalism

The damage caused by SLAPPs extends far beyond the individual cases:

• Chilling effect: When one journalist is sued, others take note. Stories that should be told are never written because the legal risk is too great, particularly for freelancers and small publishers who cannot afford to defend a claim.
• Financial devastation: Even a successful defence can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds. Freelance journalists and small publications may face bankruptcy.
• Emotional toll: Being the subject of aggressive legal proceedings causes significant stress and anxiety. See our guide to mental health resources for journalists.
• Self-censorship: The mere threat of legal action can lead to self-censorship, with journalists avoiding entire subject areas or softening their reporting to minimise legal risk.

UK Legal Protections

The Defamation Act 2013

The Defamation Act 2013 introduced several important protections for journalists, including the "serious harm" threshold (a claimant must show that the publication has caused or is likely to cause serious harm to their reputation), a new public interest defence, and protections for peer-reviewed statements in scientific and academic journals. However, the Act does not specifically address SLAPPs.

The Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation Bill

Following sustained campaigning by the NUJ, the Society of Editors, and anti-SLAPP organisations, the UK Government introduced anti-SLAPP legislation. The key provisions include:

• Early dismissal mechanism: Defendants can apply to have SLAPP claims struck out at an early stage, before incurring the full costs of defending the action.
• Cost protection: Measures to protect defendants from being overwhelmed by the claimant's legal costs during proceedings.
• Definition of SLAPPs: A statutory definition that identifies the hallmarks of a SLAPP, including the power imbalance and the targeting of public participation.

While this legislation represents progress, campaigners argue that the provisions need to be strengthened and that implementation will be key to their effectiveness.

Recognising a SLAPP Early

The earlier you recognise that a legal threat has the hallmarks of a SLAPP rather than a genuine grievance, the better positioned you and your editor are to respond proportionately rather than capitulating to pressure. Certain patterns recur across UK SLAPP cases:

• Disproportionate initial demands: Letters that demand not just correction but complete withdrawal of a story, destruction of source material, and an apology — often before any specific factual inaccuracy has even been identified.
• Multiple law firms and jurisdictions threatened simultaneously: Claimants sometimes instruct several firms to send near-identical threatening letters across different jurisdictions, maximising the psychological and financial pressure on a small publisher.
• Focus on cost rather than merit: Threatening letters that emphasise the scale of potential legal costs more than the substance of the alleged wrong are a classic SLAPP signature.
• Timing designed to disrupt publication: Threats that arrive with unusually tight deadlines just before a planned publication date, aiming to delay or derail the story rather than genuinely resolve a dispute.

What to Do If You Receive a SLAPP Threat

If you receive an aggressive legal letter threatening action over your journalism, here is what you should do:

• Do not panic: Many SLAPP threats never progress to actual litigation. The letter itself is often the primary weapon.
• Do not respond immediately: Take time to assess the situation and seek advice before replying.
• Contact the NUJ: If you are an NUJ member, contact the union's legal team immediately. The NUJ can provide advice, legal support, and representation.
• Contact your publisher's legal team: If you are a staff journalist, alert your editor and in-house lawyers. If you are a freelancer, contact the publication that ran the story.
• Contact the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE): CASE provides support and connects journalists facing SLAPPs with legal resources.
• Preserve all evidence: Keep copies of all correspondence, your source materials, and your notes. Do not delete anything.
• Document the threat: Keep a record of the threatening behaviour, including the timing, the tone, and the demands being made.

Resources and Support

• NUJ Legal Support: Available to all NUJ members facing legal threats related to their journalism
• Media Defence: An international organisation that provides legal defence funding for journalists, including those facing SLAPPs
• Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE): Provides resources, advocacy, and support for journalists facing SLAPP threats
• Press Freedom organisations: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) can raise international awareness of SLAPP threats

How the Industry Can Respond

Fighting SLAPPs requires collective action. Individual journalists cannot stand alone against well-funded legal threats. The industry needs to:

• Support robust anti-SLAPP legislation and monitor its implementation
• Establish legal defence funds for journalists facing SLAPP threats
• Publicise SLAPP cases to raise awareness of the tactic
• Ensure that newsroom legal departments are trained to recognise and resist SLAPP tactics
• Support union membership as a collective defence against legal intimidation

Practical Checklist

Run through these the moment an aggressive legal letter about your journalism arrives:

• Do not respond to the letter until you have taken advice from your editor, in-house lawyer, or the NUJ
• Preserve every piece of correspondence, source material, and research note relating to the story
• Assess whether the letter shows SLAPP hallmarks: disproportionate demands, tight deadlines, or cost-focused threats
• Contact the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE) if the threat appears to fit the SLAPP pattern
• Do not take the story down or issue a retraction before receiving legal advice
• Check whether your publication or your own NUJ membership provides legal expenses insurance or defence fund access
• Document the timeline of the threat for potential use in an early-dismissal application

Common Mistakes

• Responding to the threat immediately and defensively: A rushed reply, sent before taking advice, can concede points or reveal information that weakens your later position.
• Taking a story down pre-emptively: Removing content in response to a threat can be read as an implicit admission of fault and may not even satisfy the claimant, who has likely already achieved their chilling effect.
• Assuming a SLAPP threat is idle: While many threats never reach trial, some do, and the financial exposure while a case is live can be severe — do not dismiss the threat without proper legal assessment.
• Fighting alone: Freelancers and small publishers who do not seek NUJ, CASE, or Media Defence support miss out on legal resources specifically designed to help them.
• Failing to document the pattern: Individual SLAPP threats can look like isolated disputes; documenting the pattern (multiple firms, tight deadlines, disproportionate demands) strengthens both your defence and the wider public case for reform.

Red Flags to Watch For

• A legal letter demands complete withdrawal of a story before identifying any specific factual inaccuracy
• Multiple law firms send near-identical threatening letters within a short period
• The letter emphasises the scale of potential costs more than the substance of the alleged wrong
• A deadline for response is set unreasonably close to a planned publication date
• The claimant has a documented history of using litigation against other journalists or publishers covering similar subjects

Further Resources

• Defamation Law for UK Journalists — the underlying legal framework SLAPPs exploit
• Digital Security for UK Journalists — protecting evidence and communications during a legal threat