Google sued for online defamation
p2pnet.net news:- Google is being sued. For online defamation. Again.
It’s already on the wrong end of a lawsuit launched by Canadian businessman Wayne Crookes (right), together with Wikimedia, Pbwiki, Yahoo, MySpace, Openpolitics.ca, Domains by Proxy, Michael Pilling, Hayley Easton, Kate Holloway, Craig Hubley, Frank Cameron, Catharine Johannson, Gareth White, various anonymous personages and, most recently, Michael Geist, a well-known Ottawa law professor and columnist.
p2pnet, already targeted by Sharman Networks, is also named.
Crookes, whose case against Warren De Simone was recently dismissed, claims linking to links which link to items which displease him amounts to defamation.
Now Google is being sued by a London businessman in an(other) landmark legal action, “that could hold the US-based company liable for the publication of inaccurate, malicious or damaging material on the internet,” says The Independent.
It’ll be interesting to see how much ink and how many bytes this story manages to get.
In Canada, Crookes has achieved a virtual media freeze, on and offline. Afraid of being added to his list of victims, print and electronic publications are conspicuous because they’re carefully avoiding mention of the case which is, of course, exactly what Crookes wants.
The UK case, the first of its kind in Britain, notes The Independent, “seeks to make search engines responsible for the content of the internet” and, “could trigger severe restrictions on the free flow of information on the web”.
Internet experts, “warned that if the action was successful it would mean Google could be held liable for the content of 11.5 billion web pages,” says the story.
In Wayne Crookes sues the Internet, “Vancouver businessman Wayne Crookes appears to have achieved something few, if any, have managed before him,” says a p2pnet post. “He’s succeeded in placing not merely a chill, but a major freeze, on the Net.”
In Britain, this new attempted to sue the Net is being brought by Brian Retkin, managing director of the internet company dotworlds.
In one anonymous posting on an internet discussion forum, he’s, “wrongly accused of cashing in on the 11 September attacks on America by offering the free registration of domain names to the US in a way that took advantage of the fervent patriotism at the time,” says The Independent, going on, “In other anonymous postings, he is wrongly and groundlessly accused of conducting fraudulent business. The allegations are believed to have originated in America, where it is much more difficult to succeed in a libel claim.”
In the States, “judges have ruled that search engines and other third party internet service and product providers are immune from defamation lawsuits,” but in Britain, “similar legal protection is conditional on the company not having notice of the complaint,” says the story. “And in Britain that area of the law is yet to be fully tested.
“In an email written by Google’s legal counsel Harjinder Obhi, the company argues: ‘Google is not responsible for the content of any result of a query which may be presented to a user of Google’s web search service. Google has absolutely no connection, control or ability to direct or influence the content of web pages which may be shown as links within any given set of search results’.”
It goes on:
Internet publishers rightly fear the libel laws in this country, which are much stricter than those of other jurisdictions. They know the onus is on them to prove the truth of any statement found on their websites. Recent UK case law has established that a company based outside the jurisdiction may not be immune from litigation in this country if the material can be read by internet users in this country.
In Canada, a murderer is assumed to be innocent until his or her guilt has been proven beyond all reasonable doubt. However, it’s the other way around when it comes to defamation: defendants must in effect prove themselves innocent.
Adds the Independent:
A successful defamation ruling against a search engine such as Google would have dramatic consequences for thousands of similar organisations or internet product providers which refine, channel and forward information. The reason that has not already happened is that the Defamation Act 1996 offers a defence to an internet product or service provider where it can claim it is unaware of defamatory or potentially defamatory material it is hosting or material arising from a search result. This protection is supported by the Electronic Commerce (EC) Directive, 2002. But the Defamation Act stipulates that once the company has been put on notice about a complaint it must take action to remove the material or block access.
Back in Canada, in response to a column by Geist in the Toronto Star, “Contrary to Michael Geist’s conjecture, online or, for that matter, off-line free speech will not be at risk from lawsuits I reluctantly filed,” wrote Crookes, going on:
Undoubtedly, as a law professor, Geist calls upon the jurisprudence that exists regarding the responsibility associated with free speech in his classes. It is not a licence to defame, to hate or to exploit.
Yahoo places strict limits on its services, as do other Internet service providers. For instance, it prohibits content that is “unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libellous, … hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable.”
But Yahoo and bloggers can’t have it both ways – on the one hand, with often admirable terms of use, while on the other turning their backs on these very policies. Nor can ISPs follow suit simply because they have deep pockets.
Unlike Geist, I oppose the Americanization of Canada’s legal system to protect those who would abuse the honoured practice of anonymity to conduct personal smear campaigns.
Finally, Geist knows that the courts have established the liability of third-party publishers in such matters when they refuse to act after notice. I’m simply asking that the courts apply the same standard that has long applied to traditional print and broadcast media to the Internet.
Jon Newton - p2pnet
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June 29th, 2007 at 1:14 pm
Crookes “reluctantly” files suits? bwaaaahahahahhaaha!
June 29th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
another great image