Originally Posted 2/27/07
On February 13, 2007 U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks threw out the first suit filed against MySpace concerning a sexual assault of a minor by someone she met on MySpace, citing section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. The Act, which immunizes online service providers from state tort claims arising from information or content posted on a service provider’s website by third parties.
The plaintiffs argued that section 230 only applies to defamation claims and other claims (trademark, copyright) concerning the actual content of the materials posted, and was not intended to bar other actions based in tort. Judge Sparks, rejected their argument and stated that the current situation is similar to Zeran v. America Online Inc. 129 F.3d 327 (4th Cir. 1997) – a 4th Circuit case that found that AOL was immune from suit for alleged damages resulting from their refusal to take down certain messages which contained offensive remarks concerning the plaintiff and references to the Oklahoma City bombings and contained his phone number. Because AOL and MySpace are merely intermediaries and are not responsible for the content – they cannot be sued.
Interestingly, enough we have had a growing number of calls come into our office concerning whether or not an individual can sue a Internet service provider or a website provider due to content posted by third parties. As the above case and several other recent cases concerning defamation show, in general the answer is no. The only person that may be held responsible for these sorts of actions are the individuals who posted the materials. A lot of time the service providers are the more appealing defendant because determining who the actual poster of certain content is may prove to be difficult and most times they are judgment proof making the company look like a deep pocket from which a judgement could be collected or a monetary settlement reached.
Anyway, I expect an appeal will be filed on this, so it may not end here. Stay tuned.
