A WOMAN whose boyfriend filmed them having sex and tried to distribute the tape to her friends, family and employer has been awarded $40,000 damages for "breach of confidence" in an Australian first.

In a judgement that has implications for how the media handles privacy issues, Victoria's Court of Appeal found that Justice Bill Gillard had erred by dismissing Alla Giller's claim for damages against her former de facto partner Boris Procopets because she had suffered distress but not psychiatric injury.

In one instance, Mr Procopets took a tape to the home of an elderly woman, the mother of a friend of Ms Giller, and returned with a video recorder when she said she didn't have one. The woman watched the tape for a couple of minutes but demanded Mr Procopets leave when she saw that it showed explicit sex.