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You're assuming that "reasonable excuse" means what you and I might think it means - "reasonable" has a very specific meaning in UK tort law, and it doesn't mea

You're assuming that "reasonable excuse" means what you and I might think it means - "reasonable" has a very specific meaning in UK tort law, and it doesn't mean reasonable - it means whatever a judge decides to be reasonable when put to several specific tests - so in practice that specifically means little.

ikeboy 11y ago
It explicitly includes if the disclosure is made with permission of the person who issued it. I think if that's included, it stands to reason that the order being public would count as well. (They're obviously fine with it being disclosed, implicit permission.) Do you have a link to the specific tests?
- vidarh 11y ago
  I pointed out elsewhere in this thread that the BT Tower was deemed an Official Secret for years and did not appear on maps, despite being a 177m building in Central London, standing out like a sore thumb in the middle of an area where the only other highrise, a km away, was 60m shorter. There were public tours and a restaurant for the first 15 years. Yet disclosing its location would still have caused you to run foul of the Official Secrets Act for years. The UK government and courts has very little sense of humour about these things and you most certainly can not in general assume that making information public even in the most blatant manner will mean that they won't still insist that the information is still legally restricted as if it is still a secret.
  - ikeboy 11y ago
    That would be a problem with the OSA, not with the act in OP. That specifically says "reasonable excuse" which would seem to include this case.
    - vidarh 11y ago
      I gave the example to point out that the government itself have historically often very explicitly not "obviously [been] fine with it being disclosed" even when they themselves have made the information in question easily accessible, such as by plopping down a 177m tower in the middle of London and inviting people to tour it. It remains to be seen if "reasonable excuse" as interpreted under UK law will be interpreted the way you assume it should, but assuming that making information public in one context means it should no longer be treated as secret has often been a bad bet in the UK, even when it gets totally ridiculous.

ikeboy 11y ago

It explicitly includes if the disclosure is made with permission of the person who issued it. I think if that's included, it stands to reason that the order being public would count as well. (They're obviously fine with it being disclosed, implicit permission.) Do you have a link to the specific tests?

vidarh 11y ago
I pointed out elsewhere in this thread that the BT Tower was deemed an Official Secret for years and did not appear on maps, despite being a 177m building in Central London, standing out like a sore thumb in the middle of an area where the only other highrise, a km away, was 60m shorter. There were public tours and a restaurant for the first 15 years. Yet disclosing its location would still have caused you to run foul of the Official Secrets Act for years. The UK government and courts has very little sense of humour about these things and you most certainly can not in general assume that making information public even in the most blatant manner will mean that they won't still insist that the information is still legally restricted as if it is still a secret.
- ikeboy 11y ago
  That would be a problem with the OSA, not with the act in OP. That specifically says "reasonable excuse" which would seem to include this case.
  - vidarh 11y ago
    I gave the example to point out that the government itself have historically often very explicitly not "obviously [been] fine with it being disclosed" even when they themselves have made the information in question easily accessible, such as by plopping down a 177m tower in the middle of London and inviting people to tour it. It remains to be seen if "reasonable excuse" as interpreted under UK law will be interpreted the way you assume it should, but assuming that making information public in one context means it should no longer be treated as secret has often been a bad bet in the UK, even when it gets totally ridiculous.