News Outlets Are Liable for Others' Facebook Comments, Court Rules
June 01 2020 - 7:05AM
Dow Jones News
By Mike Cherney
SYDNEY--Newspapers and television stations that post their own
articles on Facebook Inc.'s platform are liable for other Facebook
users' defamatory comments on those posts, an Australian court
ruled Monday, presenting a fresh dilemma for traditional publishers
in the social-media age.
Media companies encourage and facilitate comments that can be
seen by other Facebook users, said the highest court in the
Australian state of New South Wales, which includes Sydney. That
means, it ruled, that the companies should be considered publishers
of the comments, responsible for their content.
The media companies that were defendants in the original
lawsuit, which include News Corp Australia as well as the publisher
of the Sydney Morning Herald, said they are considering a further
appeal to the country's highest court.
"Today's decision means the media cannot share any story via
Facebook without fear of being sued for comments which they did not
publish and have no control over," they said. "It also creates the
extraordinary situation where every public Facebook page--whether
it be held by politicians, businesses or courts--is now liable for
third-party comments on those pages."
News Corp Australia is a subsidiary of News Corp, which also
owns Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal.
The decision could also threaten social-media platforms like
Facebook, which count on news articles for traffic and ad revenue.
In April, Australian authorities said they would require Facebook
and Alphabet Inc.'s Google to pay local media organizations for
their content, amid a broader debate over whether the tech
companies are unfairly benefiting from news articles on their
platforms.
Australia has also moved to hold social-media companies
themselves responsible for what users post. After a live stream of
a shooting spree at New Zealand mosques last year was posted on
Facebook, Australia passed legislation that allows social-media
platforms to be fined if they don't remove violent content
quickly.
Monday's case was initially brought by Dylan Voller, who was
detained in a juvenile detention center and became the subject of
media attention. Articles about Mr. Voller that media outlets
posted on Facebook drew comments from other Facebook users falsely
accusing him of serious crimes, according to his lawyer, Peter
O'Brien.
The court heard evidence that traditional media companies use
Facebook to drive traffic to their own websites, Mr. O'Brien's
statement said: "With this strong commercial imperative driving
them, it really is a no-brainer that the media companies lent their
assistance to the publication of third-party comments."
In the U.S., Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act
broadly exempts social-media companies like Facebook from legal
liability for what people post on the site. However, after Twitter
Inc. last month applied a fact-checking notice to tweets by
President Trump, the president signed an executive order that could
curb some of those legal protections.
Michael Douglas, a defamation lawyer and senior lecturer at the
University of Western Australia, said if Monday's ruling stands,
traditional media companies could be forced to beef up monitoring
of third-party comments on their social-media posts. Aside from an
appeal, Mr. Douglas said he'd expect the companies to lobby state
and federal governments to change defamation laws. A review of the
laws is already under way.
"It's a big challenge to the business model of publishers,
because it means there is a greater risk any time you create
content which is in any way controversial," he said. "There is a
risk that users will write something objectionable, which will open
up the entity behind the account to being sued for defamation."
The media companies said Monday that the court's ruling failed
to acknowledge that Facebook doesn't give media companies the
ability to turn off comments. Facebook should be held responsible
for content posted by users, they said.
Facebook pages generally offer some ability to moderate content,
including hiding and deleting comments.
"We are aware of the court's decision today and we are reviewing
it carefully," Facebook said.
Monday's ruling, which upheld a decision from last year, didn't
determine whether the Facebook comments regarding Mr. Voller were
in fact defamatory.
Write to Mike Cherney at mike.cherney@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 01, 2020 06:50 ET (10:50 GMT)
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