Our Team
Mark Thomson
Senior Partner and Solicitor Advocate
Mark Thomson is a noted specialist in all aspects of media law, with more than three decades of experience in Defamation, Breach of Confidence, Privacy and Harassment. He acts for both Claimants and Defendants. He also practices in the areas of Copyright and Passing Off and does media regulatory work.
After reading Natural Sciences at Cambridge, Mark did his articles at McKenna & Co. He joined Schilling & Lom in 1988, and became a Partner in 1992. He was a partner at Carter-Ruck from 2002 to 2009. Further, in 2009 he founded the boutique media law firm, Thomson Heath & Associates and is the Senior Director of Thomson Heath & Associates.
Mark has acted for many high profile clients including Keira Knightley, Naomi Campbell, Lily Allen, Sienna Miller, Margaret McDonagh, Sadie Frost, Jude Law, Michelle Collins, Sir Simon Hughes, Sir Michael Parkinson and Imogen Thomas.
Mark was also involved in the landmark privacy cases of Campbell v MGN and McKennitt v Ash. He acted for Sienna Miller in one of the earliest phone hacking cases against the News of the World and was lead solicitor in the New Groups Phone hacking litigation from December 2011 until July 2014. He also represented Sadie Frost who secured the then highest Court award for Privacy damages of £260,000 against Mirror Group newspapers.
Mark has been a pioneer of the harassment injunction against intrusive paparazzi photographers, obtaining orders for clients such as Sienna Miller, Lily Allen and Tinglan Hong.
Finally, Mark was founding editor of the Inforrm media law blog and a contributor to “Privacy and the Media: the Developing Law”.
Chambers and Partners
Mark is ranked in Band 1 in the Chambers and Partners UK-wide Defamation/Reputation Management Legal Rankings. The 2021 Edition described him as “a highly regarded claimant-focused defamation and privacy lawyer”. He is particularly renowned for his work representing individuals whose phones were hacked by various newspapers. "An incredible privacy lawyer." "An extremely good litigator who is a real details man and great at the strategy of litigation."
Legal 500
The 2021 Legal 500 Hall of Fame: “First-class media litigator Mark Thomson has a strong track-record in landmark rulings pertaining to privacy law.”