Legions of Web users and Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and other major Internet providers dodged a potential legal morass today with a California Supreme Court ruling that found they cannot be sued for posting libelous material written by others.
In a 34-page ruling, the state’s high court overturned a lower court decision that had stripped immunity against such lawsuits and alarmed free speech advocates who warned it could chill expression on the Internet. Despite reservations about offering blanket legal protection for posting defamatory material written by others, the Supreme Court unanimously concluded that federal law is clear on the subject.
“We acknowledge that recognizing broad immunity for defamatory republications on the Internet has some troubling consequences,” Justice Carol Corrigan wrote for the court. “Until Congress chooses to revise the settled law in this area, however, plaintiffs who contend they were defamed in an Internet posting may only seek recovery from the original source of the statement.”
The legal battle stems from a lawsuit originally filed in Alameda County Superior Court by two doctors who accused a San Diego woman of defaming them by posting critical remarks about their organization. A judge dismissed the lawsuit in 2001, but a state appeals court restored the complaint two years ago, triggering the Supreme Court’s intervention.
Media organizations, free speech groups and a host of companies, from Google to eBay, weighed in with arguments in the case, warning that allowing libel lawsuits against any Web user or Internet Service Provider would inhibit the freewheeling Web. For the most part, the Supreme Court agreed, finding that the federal immunity against lawsuits “serves to protect online freedom of expression and to encourage self-regulation.”
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Contact Howard Mintz at hmintz@mercurynews.com or (408) 286-0236.
