Nigel Roberts, who runs his own internet business, took Media Logistics UK to the small claims court claiming a breach of EU law when the company sent him a series of marketing e-mails. As the company in question was registered under the Data Protection Act, Mr Roberts was able to ascertain the source of their data.

Mr Roberts says this to be a CD-ROM purchased by Media Logistics UK two years ago containing data collected by a now defunct internet company. Mr Roberts claims not to have heard of them, as says that he did not provide them with his details. Media Logistics were not available when contacted by Times Online to comment on this.

The court ruled in favour of Mr Roberts and awarded him £270 in damages, plus costs, after Media Logistics UK chose not to defend the case.

Since 2003, when the directive came into force, member states of the EU have been under a legal obligation to ensure that their national law forces marketing companies to seek the consent of customers before sending them e-mails, letters or telephoning them. Now that an individual has secured a victory, it will undoubtedly cause retailers and marketers some worry as they assess the likely impact of their own privacy policies.

Here in Britain, consumers are protected by the Office of the Information Commissioner, who has the power to fine companies breaking the Data Protection Act or the Statutory Instrument 2003 No 2426 (Privacy and Electronic Communications).

The regulations emanating from Brussels and Whitehall are open to wide interpretation but in their strictest sense they required marketing companies to receive informed consent from customers before contacting them. This in effect should bar what web marketers class as a "soft opt-in".

A soft-opt-in is a pre-ticked box that is accompanied by text saying something similar to "I wish to receive information from carefully selected third parties with offers that may be of interest to me". Under the EC Directive, the boxes should be left un-ticked, so that a consumer must make an active decision to receive communications from the company in question and their third party partners.

Indeed, it may be that informed consent could be interpreted as requiring companies to include text such as: "to receive information from us please write to us at the address below or e-mail us at…" In this case, customers who wish to receive information from marketing companies would need to write to them out of their own initiative.

In my view, many companies have yet to update their procedures to allow consumers to give informed consent to be contacted. You only have to look at the registration forms of any major online business to find a plethora of boxes, seeking you to do something to "opt out" rather than "opt in". All of this is in contravention of the directive.

There have been, however, some notable exceptions. The discount retailer Matalan was forced to drop its policy of only allowing customers to shop with them if they filled in a membership form that tied them into receiving communications. A spokeswoman told me today that this was to ensure "that Matalan did not break the law".

The store does still offer membership cards and while consumers do not have to sign-up for one, they are automatically presented one at the checkout. The spokeswoman was unable to confirm if the current practice was in accordance with the EU directive.

What the Roberts ruling will do, almost certainly, is force every retailer to re-examine their privacy policies. They will probably also incur a cost in lost income from third party sales, as the number of consumer contacts that they pass on is bound to diminish.

And they might just have to face paying court fines to other, disgruntled customers who might just opt to follow Mr Roberts for their day in court.

Benjamin Cohen is an online entrepreneur, the founder of PinkUnlimited.co.uk, and a regular contributor to Times Online

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