Author: Sreelata Menon
Something you’ve read or you’ve heard has annoyed you, provoked you. And you want to let off steam on the net?
Be a little cautious. For you can be up for libel.
The anonymity of the net is no longer protection enough.
Even linking a so called allegedly defamatory third party article to your personal blog can have you liable for action as was the experience of an ordinary Indian blogger recently.
In another instance a blogger posted a blog on his personal website highlighting a television channel’s handling of the Mumbai 26/11 massacre. He was served a legal notice, forced to retract and withdraw his post.
In the USA, Yale Law School saw two of its women students file a defamation law suit against 40 ‘anonymous’ users of a website message board and its moderator for allowing some offensive posts about them. What started off as some innocuous but extremely offensive college banter has now escalated into a full blown debate of ‘the right to anonymous free speech against the legal right to sue for defamation’.
Again recently a person has sued ‘Google’ for some, what she considered ‘offensive’ posts that a blogger since deceased had posted. As the blogger is dead she avers that suing Google is the only way to have that content removed.
So what constitutes defamation?
When does ‘criticism’ become defamation?
When one does’s post on one’s own personal blog become liable for legal action?
Defamation comes into play when criticism, slander, malice and the intent to malign has been established.
But what if there is no such intent and is just a strongly worded reaction in general to another person’s/institution’s activities? And it is your personal opinion or a writer’s perception of things?
It is then how courts look at the ‘context of a statement’ that is crucial
In the USA ‘For a blog, a court would likely start with the general tenor, setting, and format of the blog, as well as the context of the links through which the user accessed the particular entry.
Next the court would look at the specific context and content of the blog entry, analyzing the extent of figurative or hyperbolic language used and the reasonable expectations of the blog’s audience.
For a court the ‘context is critical’.’
(http://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/defamation)
Up until now in India these are largely unchartered waters. The Information and Technology Act 2000 does not speak of bloggers or blogging. The Internet, its websites and its blogs are still a new as yet untested frontier.
Even though ‘litigation’ is a national pastime, going to court in India is expensive, time consuming, and usually inconclusive. So no one goes to court unless absolutely compelled to, least of all against a blogger, one would safely assume. But that is about to change if these recent trends are anything to go by. The absolute right to write and express one’s opinion, in other words ‘free speech’ -on the web- is about to take a hit as regulatory laws are in the process of being formulated.
So it would perhaps be better to err on the side of caution before you decide to take off on what is on your mind, hammer it out and post it.
Who knows who it’s going to offend!
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