The AMSRS said in a statement published on its Linkedin group (obtained by marketing blog Mumbrella) that the society and its president Peter Harris had been “served with proceedings in the New South Wales Supreme Court by Mark McCrindle and McCrindle Research”.

“Through these proceedings, Mr McCrindle and McCrindle Research are seeking, among other things, to restrain the AMSRS and its president from further dealing with the complaints until a final determination by the court.” The AMSRS plans to defend against the legal action.

The substance of the complaints made against McCrindle Research are not known, but the AMSRS announced an investigation into the company last year after allegations were raised in the ABC TV show Media Watch that McCrindle Research had mis-stated the sample sizes used in several studies previously quoted in the press.

Soon after Media Watch aired, McCrindle Research issued a correction stating that: “In the early years… when releasing internal, unpaid research, the methodology line referring to the number of people surveyed would sometimes record the number of people sent the survey rather than the number of surveys completed.”

McCrindle maintained that the issues raised by Media Watch were historical and were “unrelated to any of our commissioned research and findings”.

Research has emailed McCrindle representatives seeking comment.