A complaint against a weekly newspaper which published a story on an assault victim which included a photo of his injuries taken from Facebook has been rejected.

The Press Complaints Commission has published a ruling on a story by the Farnham Herald from 15 June with the headline “Assaulted after night out”.

The injured man complained that the story was inaccurate and intruded into his private life in breach of Clause 1 (Accuracy) and Clause 3 (Privacy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice.

But the PCC has not upheld his complaint, saying the report was a straightforward acount of the incident and the photograph of his injured face had not been taken out of context.

The complainant was concerned that despite an assurance from the police that he would not be identified as a victim of the assault, the newspaper had identified him.

He also denied several claims made in the article, including that he had been “embroiled” in a fight and that he had “almost had his nose bitten off”.

The complainant said that the newspaper had based the story on comments posted on Facebook and had not sought to verify the information with him, saying he believed that privacy settings were in place on his Facebook account.

The newspaper said one of its reporters, who had a mutual acquaintance with the complainant, had seen a comment – posted by this shared Facebook friend – identifying the complainant as the victim of the attack.

The reporter had then accessed the complainant’s Facebook page, which had no privacy settings, where the complainant had posted the photograph and had identified himself as the victim of an attack.

The reporter had then made inquiries with the police who had confirmed the incident and provided further information.

It also provided an image of a Facebook message its reporter had sent to the complainant requesting comments.

The paper had removed the article from its website when it learned of the complainant’s concerns, but did not accept it had breached the Editors’ Code.

In its adjudication, the Commission acknowledged the complainant’s concerns that the information had been published more widely than he had originally intended but noted that he had “unwittingly” confirmed his involvement in the incident and the extent of the injuries he suffered to the newspaper.

It considered that the report was a straightforward account of a newsworthy incident, substantially corroborated by local police, which included no gratuitous information about the complainant’s private life.

The photograph had been used to illustrate his injuries and had not been taken out of context.

The PCC did not uphold the complaint under Clause 1 or 3.

Charlotte Dewar, Head of Complaints and Pre-publication Services, said: “This case demonstrates some of the challenges faced by editors when they contemplate publishing material taken from social networking sites.

“In this instance, the presentation of the story was critical to the Commission’s conclusion that there was no breach of the Code.”