From footballers and actors to television personalities, dozens of high-profile figures have used privacy injunctions to keep alleged affairs and sexual misconduct claims out of the public eye.

David Walliams was identified this week as the “well-known man” who had applied for a gagging order to prevent allegations against him from being reported.

A judge rejected his application, and the comedian has since faced public accusations involving girls as young as 15. He strongly denies the claims.

Although Walliams’ attempt was unsuccessful, scores of celebrities, sportspeople and other public figures have successfully turned to the courts to suppress allegations of infidelity and sexual misconduct.

Official figures show that 111 applications for new privacy injunctions have been made over the past decade.

Another prominent male celebrity, who has been accused of having “multiple” victims, is also understood to be protected by a court order.

Justine Smith, of Private Eye magazine, said the unnamed star had secured the order several months ago and remained “in the public eye”.

Most injunction applications involving celebrities are used to conceal alleged affairs, with applicants relying on arguments based on privacy law.

Among the public figures who still cannot be named in the Press is PJS, a married celebrity who was alleged to have had a threesome with a couple in a paddling pool filled with olive oil.

Lower courts initially rejected his application for a privacy injunction, reasoning that the alleged conduct conflicted with his public image as a devoted married man. The Supreme Court later ruled in his favour.

David Walliams was identified this week as the “well-known man” who had sought a gagging order to block reports of allegations against him

Other stars to obtain injunctions include a footballer who suppressed claims that he had cheated on his partner with another celebrity, and a married actor who was alleged to have been unfaithful with Helen Wood, the escort who also slept with Wayne Rooney.

In 2015, a high-profile female celebrity described as a “figure of trust” secured an injunction in Manchester to prevent her lover from selling details of her affair with a famous married man to the Press.

Others who have kept alleged indiscretions out of the headlines include a football manager accused of having a secret lover, a “world-famous” sportsman alleged to have had an affair and a well-known married man in the entertainment industry.

In another case, a “high-profile figure” obtained an injunction to stop a woman disclosing details of sexual encounters at his home, arguing that reports would cause his family “very great distress”.

Marcus Johnstone, a specialist sexual offences lawyer at PCD Solicitors, said injunctions had frequently been used to restrict damaging Press coverage.

“Injunctions are made against a party, such as a news organisation or television production company, to prevent it from reporting allegations concerning an individual,” he told the Mail.

“Courts can issue an interim injunction, which is a temporary order that may be drafted very broadly and prevents reporting while the court examines the proceedings.

“The court then establishes what has actually happened. If a final injunction is granted, it will set out more precisely what is covered and which parties are bound by it.”

The use of privacy injunctions has varied considerably over the years.

Ministry of Justice figures show that there were two applications for new interim injunctions during the first half of the year.

There was also one hearing concerning a final privacy injunction and another involving the continuation or alteration of an existing order.

Proceedings of all types remained comparatively limited between 2016 and 2023, generally numbering between six and nine every six months. The figure then rose sharply during 2024, reaching 18 between January and June 2025.

The first six months of 2025 represented the busiest period on record, with 11 new applications and six cases involving the renewal or variation of an existing injunction.

Between 2016 and 2026, there were 111 applications for new interim privacy injunctions, alongside 16 hearings involving final injunctions and 43 hearings concerning the continuation or variation of existing orders.

Ryan Giggs famously obtained a gagging order to suppress reports of an alleged affair. However, it was secured in England and did not apply in Scotland, allowing Scottish newspapers to name him

A married actor also obtained an injunction after allegedly cheating on his wife with escort Helen Wood

Mr Johnstone said an injunction generally binds only the people or organisations specifically named in the court order. It may also apply to “unknown parties”, although those individuals must have been made aware of the order.

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Injunctions do not stop alleged victims from contacting the police. However, by limiting media coverage of suspected wrongdoing, they can reduce the likelihood that other people will come forward.

“Even a superinjunction—which prevents the existence of the injunction itself from being reported—cannot remove the police’s right to investigate,” Mr Johnstone said.

“It cannot override criminal law or an individual’s right to report an alleged crime to the police. People can still come forward, so an injunction should not prevent them from speaking out.”

The lawyer predicted that injunctions would become less attractive to celebrities as the modern media environment increasingly exposes their limitations.

“The use of injunctions 10 or 15 years ago was entirely different from the situation today.

“Walliams was the worst-kept secret around. It was circulating on social media and being reported everywhere outside England and Wales, including in Scotland. That makes a mockery of the whole concept of an injunction.”

Several celebrities have obtained privacy injunctions, only for their identities to emerge later.

The best-known example involved Ryan Giggs, who secured a gagging order in April 2011 to block reports of his alleged affair with model Imogen Thomas.

The attempt to silence the story unravelled after a sustained campaign on Twitter led Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming to name Giggs in Parliament.

Giggs had already been identified in Scotland, where injunctions granted in England and Wales do not automatically apply. The Sunday Herald published a photograph of him on its front page.

It later emerged that Giggs had also had an affair with his brother’s wife.

Jeremy Clarkson was granted a secrecy order in 2010 to prevent his former wife, Alex Hall, from claiming that they had conducted an affair after he remarried.

After his name appeared on social media, Clarkson chose to lift the order, saying: “Injunctions don’t work—it’s pointless.”

Andrew Marr became the first public figure to openly acknowledge that he had attempted to conceal an affair through the courts.

Chelsea star John Terry secured an injunction in 2010 to prevent newspapers reporting an alleged affair with Vanessa Perroncel, the former girlfriend of his Chelsea and England team-mate Wayne Bridge. Ms Perroncel is pictured with Bridge

Ryan Giggs secured a gagging order in April 2011 to suppress reports of his alleged affair with model Imogen Thomas. He is pictured with his wife, Stacey Cooke

Mr Marr obtained a High Court injunction in January 2008 to suppress reports of a relationship with a fellow journalist five years earlier.

At the time, he believed he had fathered a child with the woman and made maintenance payments until a DNA test showed that he was not the girl’s father.

Chelsea star John Terry also secured an injunction in 2010 to prevent newspapers reporting an alleged affair with Vanessa Perroncel, the former girlfriend of his Chelsea and England team-mate Wayne Bridge.

A judge later discharged the order, saying Terry appeared more concerned about the potential impact on his lucrative sponsorship agreements than his family’s privacy.

The allegations involving Walliams, together with the recent imprisonment of comedian Russell Brand, have renewed debate over accountability, secrecy and the legal tools available to protect high-profile figures from scrutiny.

The cases have also prompted calls for a review of non-disclosure agreements, or NDAs, which are widely used in the entertainment industry to prevent people from revealing supposedly confidential information.

Make-up artist Lou Teasdale said it was “open and standard protocol” for women to sign NDAs and hand over their phones before being left alone with a famous man.

In an Instagram post published yesterday, the stylist—whose celebrity clients have included members of One Direction—said: “I’m not accusing any of the people I worked with of wrongdoing.

“I’m talking about a culture that exists, and is entirely legal, in which a celebrity man’s privacy is treated as more important than a woman’s safety.

“How can a man be expected to act with any accountability when an agreement is put in place beforehand to remove a woman’s voice and take away the device that could keep her safe?”

Giving evidence to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee yesterday, media minister Ian Murray said he was “deeply saddened and also angry” by the prevalence of abuse by men in the media industry.

NDAs, he added, were “a major part of the problem”.

Britons in middle age may face a higher risk of life-threatening complications from weight-loss injections, according to a striking new analysis.

Figures obtained by the Daily Mail show that more than four times as many deaths associated with the drugs have been reported among people in their 60s as among those in their 40s.

This is despite Britons in their 40s being around three-and-a-half times more likely to receive prescriptions for the medications.

The findings have raised fresh questions about whether older patients are more vulnerable to serious side effects from popular treatments including Mounjaro and Wegovy.

The figures are based on reports submitted to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) through its Yellow Card scheme, which records suspected adverse reactions to medicines.

In total, 311 deaths have now been reported in connection with glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists — a 44 per cent rise from the 216 recorded in August.

The reports do not prove that the drugs caused the deaths. They indicate only that patients, relatives or healthcare professionals believed the medicines might have contributed.

However, an age breakdown examined by the Daily Mail revealed a notable pattern, with substantially more deaths reported among people in their 60s than among younger adults. The figures also include one person aged between 10 and 19 who was reported to have died after taking the medication.

The analysis comes as concerns over the safety of weight-loss drugs intensify, with calls for stricter oversight of their use.

Earlier this week, US health officials issued new warnings about Ozempic and other diabetes and weight-loss injections, including Wegovy, Mounjaro and Zepbound. The alerts relate to a rare condition that can cause sudden and permanent loss of sight.

The action by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) follows similar warnings from British regulators in February and European authorities last year.

The latest figures are likely to concern the estimated 2.5 million Britons currently using the injections, medically known as GLP-1 agonists.

Around 200,000 people receive the drugs through the NHS, while most users obtain them privately and pay for the treatment themselves.

Data from The Health Foundation and Click2Pharmacy, which sells the medicines, indicates that people aged 30 to 49 account for about 57 per cent of private GLP-1 prescriptions.

Yet MHRA figures show that this age group represents just 12 per cent of deaths associated with the drugs.

People aged 50 to 69, meanwhile, account for 32.4 per cent — just under one-third — of all private GLP-1 prescriptions.

Despite this, they represent almost half of the reported deaths. The pattern is also evident among older adults, according to the data.

Prescribing falls sharply among people over 69, who account for only 1.5 per cent of Britons taking GLP-1 drugs.

However, this group represents a disproportionate 15 per cent of all reported deaths. Thirty-eight people aged 70 to 79 died from causes associated with the injections, along with nine people in their 80s.

By comparison, 20 adults aged 30 to 39 died from causes linked to the injections, while a further 20 deaths were recorded among people aged 40 to 49.

There were 62 reported deaths among people in their 50s and 88 among those in their 60s.

For most people who take GLP-1 drugs, the medicines will not cause serious complications. Research also suggests they may provide benefits beyond weight loss, including protection against diabetes and possibly dementia and certain cancers.

Nevertheless, the drugs have been associated with potentially fatal complications.

These include severe dehydration and disturbances in the body’s essential minerals, which can trigger abnormal heart rhythms or cardiac arrest. Liver injury and severe flu-like symptoms have also been reported.

Earlier this year, a 19-year-old student died in London after developing an abnormal heart rhythm caused by low blood sugar. A coroner concluded that the condition was likely triggered by tirzepatide, the drug used in Mounjaro.

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Other serious complications associated with the medicines include gallbladder disease and acute pancreatitis — a potentially fatal inflammation of the pancreas that can sometimes lead to organ failure.

Studies indicate that middle-aged and older adults may be more likely to report such problems while taking the drugs.

One possible reason is that older patients are more likely to live with multiple long-term conditions and take several medicines, which may increase the risk of complications.

Pancreatitis can also be more difficult to identify in older patients. Instead of the severe abdominal pain commonly associated with the condition, they may develop less obvious symptoms including confusion, tiredness or mild stomach discomfort.

This can mean the illness is more advanced by the time it is diagnosed.

Experts caution that the findings may partly reflect the fact that older adults are generally more likely to have serious underlying health conditions.

‘People in older age groups have a higher chance of dying anyway,’ says Dr Alex Miras, senior clinical lecturer and consultant endocrinologist at Imperial College London.

‘They are more likely to be unwell or to have severe health conditions than adults in their 40s and 50s — such as advanced diabetes, liver disease or heart disease that has developed over many years.

‘Those conditions themselves increase the risk of serious illness and premature death.

‘Older adults are also more likely to take other medicines that could interact with GLP-1 agonists or independently increase the risk of certain conditions.’

There are also concerns about the impact of rapid weight loss on older patients, particularly the loss of muscle and bone.

Although GLP-1 drugs are highly effective at helping people lose excess fat, studies show that some of the weight lost may be muscle tissue.

This is especially concerning for older people, who naturally lose muscle mass and bone strength as they age.

Further muscle loss can cause weakness and reduced mobility, increasing the risk of falls, while weaker bones make fractures more likely.

A 2017 study found that adults aged 45 to 76 who followed a weight-loss programme for more than a decade had a 39 per cent higher risk of fractures to the hip, shoulder, upper arm or pelvis.

However, experts emphasise that there is currently no convincing evidence that weight-loss drugs are inherently more dangerous for older patients.

‘Real-world evidence is not yet showing us that these medicines do not work for this age group or that they cause problems,’ says Dr Miras.

‘But when we prescribe these drugs to older people, we need to consider carefully what we are trying to achieve and whether the benefits outweigh the potential risks.’

Doctors also note that many of the millions of people taking the drugs already have serious health conditions that increase their risk of illness or death, regardless of whether they are receiving treatment.

Speaking previously to the Mail, Dr Naveed Sattar, professor of cardiometabolic medicine at the University of Glasgow, said: ‘When millions of people at higher risk take a medicine, some will inevitably suffer major health events or die while receiving treatment, whether or not the medicine played a role.

‘We also know that some people obtain these medicines privately, and they may not all have significant health conditions, unlike some patients who receive them through the NHS. It is important that anyone experiencing problems reports them to their doctor.’

Regulators have also attempted to reassure patients that serious side effects remain uncommon and that the medicines provide substantial benefits for most people.

Alison Cave, the MHRA’s chief safety officer, said: ‘For the vast majority of patients prescribed GLP-1s, these are safe and effective medicines that provide significant health benefits.

‘The risk of developing these severe side effects is very small, but patients and healthcare professionals must be aware of them and remain alert to the associated symptoms.’

On January 7, Mostafa Sepahvand’s sentence in Iran was reduced to three years and nine months, along with 74 lashes as a discretionary punishment.

Iranian agents, however, complained that Sepahvand had failed to complete the assignment.

In a message to his friend Mostafa Ghorbani in Iran, he said: ‘Brother, it was meant to be one address, but I went to three. It was meant to take one week, but I spent three weeks on it.’

Two Iranian intelligence contacts, known as Haji and Amin, later visited Ghorbani’s home. According to Sepahvand, ‘all they would talk about was that issue – who pocketed the money for whom?’

Sepahvand told him: ‘I swear on my mother’s life, if they put him in my hands, I’ll finish him off, but he isn’t there.’

‘They gave me £3,900, bro. Which fool would take on this kind of job for that money? Brother, by God, if I had stabbed this guy, they wouldn’t have paid me anything. They’re liars.’

In a voice note sent to Ghorbani on February 24 last year, Sepahvand said: ‘We’ve ended up dealing with a bunch of idiots. They send photographs based on nothing and tell me, “Find him”, but I don’t know how I’m supposed to find him.’

He continued: ‘All these addresses are useless. It doesn’t matter to me because I get paid. I’ll go wherever they tell me; I have no problem with that, however they want it and whenever they want it. What else can I say?

‘If they want, I’ll record a video. If they want, I’ll send photographs, so they can’t say tomorrow that I didn’t do it. They know themselves that it’s nonsense, but they won’t admit it.’

In another voice note, he said: ‘The way Amin talks, you’d think he was in London. That attitude gets on my nerves. He says, “He is there 100 per cent.”

‘Brother, I swear they didn’t get any further than Dargah, yet they make it sound as though they know every street and back alley in the area.

‘They’re talking complete f**king nonsense. They watch too many crime films. They sit behind a computer and carry out a few Google searches.’

On February 26, Sepahvand told Ghorbani he still had not received the promised pardon. ‘Brother, I haven’t received any ruling from these people. I need to see something with my own eyes. Right now, I’m going around handling their business.

‘Wherever you tell me to go, I’m at your service. I’ll even ask my own people to do it. I swear on the Koran and on my father’s soul, let us find him and pay him a visit. There is nothing I’d like more than to see him.’

Two days later, on February 28, Ghorbani told Sepahvand that he was with Haji and Amin and that his case had been ‘closed for another four months, and you won’t receive a prison sentence either.’

Ghorbani promised: ‘Once the job is done, the case will be over. They’ll even get you a house, and when you arrive at the airport, they’ll collect you from the gate themselves. They also said they would pay the fine.’

But he added: ‘You’ll have to find him using your own money.’

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On March 20, Sepahvand sent Ghorbani another lengthy voice note, again expressing his frustration with Amin, the intelligence contact.

‘Go and tell Amin that he’s still a kid. I’ve travelled all over the world, so he shouldn’t try to fool me.’

He said he had been told a house was under ‘non-physical surveillance’, but added: ‘You use GPS to pull up photographs and then think you’re dealing with a f**king idiot.’

Sepahvand said he feared being caught and added: ‘I’ve told you a hundred times that these addresses are wrong.

‘Besides that, it seems these people don’t even understand what offence they’re asking someone to commit. They’re deliberately turning a blind eye to it. If I’m caught here, that’s it. I’ll have to say goodbye.’

He also said he had been promised that his court case would be resolved and that he would receive £150,000 after completing the assignment and being shown the target. ‘They haven’t given me any of that either,’ Sepahvand said.

‘I’m not their errand boy, to be sent from one address to another. For God’s sake, when someone is being hired for a job, they pay him first. I’m not going there to work as a labourer.

‘This job involves committing a criminal offence. Given the seriousness of it, I’m expected to spend my own money, risk my life, use my car, sacrifice my time, leave my wife and home, and chase after their business, only to end up completely f**ked because of them.’

He accused Haji and Amin of ‘sitting there smoking shisha while I chase after their empty, suspicious addresses – their bogus, worthless, two-bit addresses.’

Sepahvand demanded: ‘From now on, tell them to send the money. Not £1,000, not £5,000 and not £6,000. They must transfer at least £10,000. Understood?

‘They’ve damaged my reputation with my friends as well. They think I’ve been paid £30,000 or £40,000. They have no idea that I’m continuing with this simply because of friendship.’

He said the agents had sent him ‘one address after another’ and were asking him to carry out ‘something that amounts to a criminal offence and carries a lengthy prison sentence.’

If the money was transferred, he said he would ‘go there and stand outside. If the target is inside, they pay the £150,000 and I’ll finish him off. Once they have the money ready and have transferred it, I’ll do the job.’

Sepahvand said ‘the problem is that we have a f**king big heart’, but added that ‘even friendship has its limits.’

‘These people transfer trillions and trillions to Syria and all sorts of other places, but when it comes to something connected to their own business, they refuse to pay. This isn’t right anymore. They’re taking advantage of me,’ Sepahvand said.

On April 25, he sent another message: ‘If my court ruling comes through, if I receive an acquittal, I’m at their service.

‘I’ve already done so much work for them, and I’ll complete the rest as well, all right? I’ll continue pursuing their business. There is nothing I’d like more than to see him. I swear on my father’s soul and by the Prophet, I would love nothing more than to see him. Of course, if my ruling comes through, I’ll do it.’

Scientists say they have identified the source of a mysterious radio signal that flashes on and off every eight minutes.

Using a powerful radio telescope, researchers from Curtin University traced the precisely timed pulses to an unusual binary star system more than 10,000 light-years from Earth.

Known as GPM J071507-114153, the system contains a dead star called a white dwarf and a G-type star that closely resembles the Sun.

The object belongs to a rare group known as long-period transients, which produce powerful radio pulses at intervals ranging from minutes to hours.

Only around a dozen long-period transients have been identified since the class was first discovered in 2021, and astronomers are still working to determine how they form.

The latest finding is the first evidence of radio pulses coming from a white dwarf orbiting a Sun-like star.

Astronomers have previously detected pulsing radio signals in systems containing white dwarfs. However, they could not establish which of the two stars was producing the emissions.

Lead author Dr Sam McSweeney, a commissioning scientist with the Square Kilometre Array Observatory radio telescope, said: ‘This is the first time the pulses are clear enough to see the white dwarf moving in its orbit around its companion, so we know that the pulsations are coming from a region close to the white dwarf, or possibly even from the white dwarf itself.’

Scientists have identified a strange star system that produces a radio signal every eight minutes (artist’s impression)

Curtin University researchers traced the regular pulses to an unusual stellar pairing located more than 10,000 light-years from Earth

Long-period transients rank among the most unusual phenomena detected by radio telescopes across the universe.

They appear as exceptionally powerful and tightly focused bursts of radio waves and X-rays, often originating in the distant reaches of space.

When these objects were first discovered, their precisely timed flashes led some people to wonder whether they could be signals sent by an extraterrestrial civilisation.

Astronomers now think the energy bursts are produced by the rapidly rotating remnants of dead stars.

Co-author Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker, an associate professor at the Curtin Institute of Radio Astronomy, told the Daily Mail: ‘Our best idea is that the white dwarf has a strong magnetic field, and its stellar companion is constantly feeding it charged particles through its stellar wind.

‘When those particles meet the white dwarf’s magnetosphere, they get accelerated and produce the pulses we see, a bit like the way the Sun’s wind interacts with Earth’s magnetic field to make aurorae.’

As the white dwarf spins, its beam sweeps across Earth in much the same way that a lighthouse beam crosses the surrounding darkness, creating the regular flashes detected by astronomers.

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GPM J071507-114153 contains a white dwarf and a faint G-type star similar to the Sun, which cannot be seen with the naked eye (pictured)

The fastest long-period transient identified so far flashes every 421 seconds. The slowest produces a 30-second pulse once every 2.9 hours.

For the study, published in Nature Astronomy, the team used the Murchison Widefield Array radio telescope to survey the entire section of the Milky Way visible from Australia.

After detecting the tell-tale pulse from GPM J071507-114153, the researchers carried out further radio and visible-light observations. These allowed them to pinpoint the system and identify the type of stars involved.

The observations provided the first clear indication that the radio pulses were coming from a white dwarf—the dense core left behind when a star reaches the end of its life—or from the region immediately surrounding it, as it orbited a bright, Sun-like star.

The result was unexpected because radio pulsars, the best-known sources of repeating radio flashes, are generally neutron stars: the extraordinarily dense remnants of massive stars.

White dwarfs are far more common than neutron stars, but only a small number have been linked to radio pulses. Until now, no isolated white dwarf had been observed producing this kind of emission.

The system also contains another surprising feature.

‘The companion is a Sun-like star, which we didn’t think was possible, and the white dwarf is spinning once every 7.9 minutes, which is extraordinarily fast for something of its size,’ says Professor Hurley-Walker.

As the white dwarf spins and follows its orbit, a beam of radiation sweeps across Earth like a lighthouse, creating the appearance of a regular flash

‘The fact that we now see this happen with a Sun-like companion, not just a red dwarf, suggests that the only necessary ingredients are a white dwarf and a companion star in an orbit that delivers enough material to the white dwarf’s magnetic field.’

The researchers were also able to detect subtle evidence of activity on the surface of the companion star.

Professor Hurley-Walker says: ‘The pulses act like a flashlight shining through the atmosphere of the companion!

‘As the white dwarf swings round to the far side of its orbit, the radio waves have to travel through the star’s outer atmosphere, the corona, before they reach us.

‘Magnetic fields in that plasma twist the polarisation of the radio waves, and we see this signature change very rapidly as the orbit progresses.’

By tracking these changes, the team found signals they believe were caused by a ‘stellar prominence’—a vast loop of plasma erupting from the surface of the companion star.

Professor Hurley-Walker adds: ‘I find it amazing that we can study the weather on a star more than 10,000 light years away, something that’s otherwise impossible!’