November 22, 2006 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — The California Supreme Court ruled this week that Web publishers are not liable for the defamatory statements made by site contributors and plaintiffs must look to the original source of the statements to seek recovery, according to reports.
The decision came late on Monday in the case of Stephen J. Barrett et al. vs. Ilena Rosenthal, when the California Supreme Court reversed an appeals court decision to hold Rosenthal accountable for republishing articles on a forum with alleged defamatory information about Barrett, stating that under the Communications Decency Act of 1996, “no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”
Some analysts say the ruling, while probably correct, might be less than idea. The idea that Web publishers could, in some cases, be complicit with the comments posted on their sites creates a need for further legislation on the subject.
Congress may have to fine tune legislation to better define the roles of publishers and their responsibilities toward content for the courts.
