TechMedia: Internet Defamation Claims Just Became More Difficult

The use of the internet to criticise others has spawned a series of defamation claims against ISPs and individuals. So far, the English courts have been happy to entertain those claims. However, more recent rulings appear to mark a change in the court's attitude to proceedings centred on chat rooms and blogs.

For example, in the recent case of Smith -v-ADVFN, Mr Justice Eady was principally concerned with deciding whether existing defamation proceedings brought by Smith should continue to be stayed as a result of his non-payment of earlier costs awards and whether any future proceedings he might bring should first be subject to the court granting permission before being commenced. The Judge made both of those orders.

In the course of his judgement, Mr Justice Eady referred to the prospects of Smith being successful in his underlying claims. The case involved comments posted on a bulletin board of a financial information website run by ADVFN.  Smith had earlier obtained disclosure orders against ADVFN to reveal the identities of the people posting comments on the site that Smith was unhappy with. He launched a number of claims against individuals as a result. The Judge described the comments posted on these bulletin boards as contributions to a casual conversation, made in an "uninhibited and ill thought out" manner.  He held that Smith's claims faced several significant hurdles and drew the conclusion that those claims were totally without merit. Amongst these hurdles were that the comments were mere "vulgar abuse" and so not actionable or were subject to defences of qualified privilege or fair comment.  

While pointing out that he was not suggesting that blogging cannot ever form the basis of a legitimate defamation claim, Mr Justice Eady made clear the court's displeasure at claims of this nature and doubted that the use of public money to resolve them was a proper use of resources.

We would expect to see the courts now applying closer scrutiny to the question of whether to grant disclosure orders against ISPs to identify people posting material and for the courts to also be more active in weeding out unmeritorious internet defamation claims at an early stage. 

For further information about this case or about media issues generally please contact Ian De Freitas at ian.defreitas@blplaw.com. 

For more information on IP please visit http://www.blplaw.com/expertise/intellectual_property/index.cfm.