Cole has filed claims against News Group Newspapers for harassment, breach of privacy and libel — even though the footballer is not named in any of the stories.

He is also claiming breach of privacy, or "false privacy", meaning that although he does not accept the allegations are true, the claims have still breached his privacy.

The first of the News of the World stories was published on February 12, headlined "Gay as you Go". It alleged: "two bisexual stars made some very dirty phone calls — using a mobile as a gay sex toy."

The article claimed that two Premiership footballers, one capped several times for England, and a music industry figure, were caught on camera involved in a "homosexual orgy".

On February 19 the News of the World published a follow-up story claiming to show two of the men involved in the alleged orgy. The picture carried the caption: "Music Figure A and Player A", but was heavily obscured.

The News of the World stories were followed in The Sun, which made similar allegations, again not naming the footballers.

Since those stories were published, there have been many attempts on internet websites and through blogs to trace the original, obscured picture that appeared in the News of the World.

The picture used by the newspaper is thought to have been altered to remove identifying details.

One alleged original is displayed on pinknews.co.uk. It shows a dance music DJ with Ashley Cole.

David Price Solicitors confirmed today that they had been instructed by the DJ to bring proceedings against the newspapers.

Cole is understood to be suing not so much on the basis of the original article, but because of the effect it has had in prompting many internet sites to speculate that he is the person in the article.

David Hooper, a partner with Reynolds Porter Chamberlain, said that a recent case over a book about the Canadian folk singer Loreena McKennitt by her former friend Neima Ash has extended the law of privacy.

The judge in that case had said that the courts could protect private information if there was a "reasonable expectation" that information would be protected, even if untrue.

That meant people did not have to "come clean" about whether information was true or not, he said.

"There used to be a real issue as to whether information could be private, if you did not acknowledge it to be true.

"So people had a choice: either admit the allegations, and go for privacy; or say they are false and go for defamation. This deterred a lot of people, who did not necessarily want to admit, for instance, gay relationships."

Niri Shan, a partner from Taylor Wessing, who acted for Abbie Jones, the nanny to David and Victoria Beckham, in their action against her, said: "Just because someone is not named does not mean they can’t sue for libel. It’s unusual but not unprecedented.

"Sometimes it is actually safer to name someone than to talk, for instance, about a professional footballer playing for Arsenal, which potentially opens up the way to 11 claims."

• Newspapers are fighting a far greater share of all reported defamation claims than they were five years ago, according to statistics from Sweet & Maxwell, the legal information provider.

  Figures from its online service show that newspapers faced 56 per cent of all reported defamation court cases in 2005 — up from 39 per cent of all cases in 2000.

  Newspapers were the only category of defendant to face an increase in actual defamation court cases over the last five years (39 in 2005 against 37 in 2000).

  The overall number of reported defamation court cases fell 27 per cent between 2000 and 2005 from 96 cases to 70.

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