Government must pay $90K to Kim Dotcom after tribunal rules it breached his privacy

[Len]

The Crown must pay controversial internet mogul Kim Dotcom $90,000 after breaching his privacy, the Human Rights Tribunal has found.

On Monday, the three-member tribunal determined Dotcom's three-year battle to have "nearly every government department" reveal personal information it held on him was valid.

"Given we have accepted Mr Dotcom as a credible witness we are of the view he has clearly and unambiguously established loss of dignity and injury to feelings," the tribunal said.

Dotcom wrote to 28 Ministers and an array of government departments in 2015 requesting all private information that was being held about him.

Led by the office of the Attorney-General, the departments all declined Dotcom's information request, treating it as "vexatious".
 

But the tribunal said there was "no proper basis" for the decision to withhold the personal information, some of which the government agreed was collected unlawfully.

Dotcom was "persuasive" and evidence produced through his lawyer was "clear, thorough and consistent", the tribunal said.

The Crown was ordered to release the information and to pay Dotcom $30,000 for "loss of benefits" caused by the breach.

It also ordered the Attorney-General to pay Dotcom another $60,000 for "loss of dignity and injury to feelings".

Following the decision, Dotcom took to Twitter trumpeting the tribunal's decision as effectively ending extradition proceedings that were launched against him following a dramatic police raid in 2012.

He is fighting the proceedings, which would see him extradited to the United States to face internet piracy-related charges.

Dotcom also called for the Privacy Commissioner to resign and said he would be launching a private prosecution against former attorney-general Chris Finlayson and former prime minister Sir John Key.