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Defamation on the web

Practice group: Litigation & dispute resolution

01 November 2007

Judgment was recently given in a case involving a message board devoted to fans of Sheffield Wednesday FC (owlstalk.co.uk). A number of users, using names such as "Halfpint", had posted messages on the website attacking the chairman, chief executive and five directors of the club.

Owlstalk.co.uk was protected from a defamation claim under the Defamation Act 1996, as innocent disseminators of (potentially) defamatory content. However, in order to sue the users it was necessary for the various officers of the club to find out the identities of these posters. To do this they took the owner of owlstalk.co.uk to court in order to force them to reveal the names of the users.

Adopting a relatively novel approach, apparently in an attempt to balance the users' right to free speech with the directors' right to their reputations, the judge (Richard Parkes QC) decided that there was a right to anonymity for those users whose postings were merely abusive or could be viewed as jokes.

For those users whose postings might "reasonably be understood to allege greed, selfishness, untrustworthiness or dishonest behaviour", they had no right to anonymity and owlstalk.co.uk were therefore obliged to hand over their real names.

In practical terms, this means that owners of message boards, blogs and other "user-driven" websites based in the UK are going to have to keep a close eye on the postings made on their sites. As there is a fine line between an abusive joke and a truly defamatory posting, the general rule should probably be "if in doubt, remove it".

For more information on defamation claims, please contact Matthew Brandis, partner in the litigation and dispute resolution team on 01753 279039 or email disputes@bpcollins.co.uk.