Yahoo sued over anonymous abuse
A California lawyer has filed a potential class action lawsuit against the
internet search company Yahoo.
Stephen Galton says he was subject to a "barrage of harassing, defamatory
and abusive messages" from anonymous users on a Yahoo message board.
Mr Galton, who wants other users to join in the suit, has accused Yahoo of
sheltering users who harass people in cyberspace.
The California-based company declined to comment.
A spokeswoman for Yahoo said: "It wouldn't be prudent for us to comment on
this pending lawsuit."
'Name-calling'
Mr Galton, a partner in legal firm Galton & Helm, registered to use Yahoo
message boards to respond to a post criticising one of his clients.
Most companies will have a specific exception which says if they are
compelled by law to hand over information they will do so
George Godar, lawyer
His defence of his client led to him being subjected to name-calling by
other message board users.
When the company refused to reveal the details of the message board users
who allegedly harassed Mr Galton, the lawyer sued the company for the
information in April.
He sought the names, addresses and phone numbers of his critics from Yahoo,
but he says it provided only partial information.
George Godar, a technology partner at law firm DLA, said US laws makes it
straightforward for people who believe they have been defamed to find out
who is behind online nicknames.
Typically, he says, a complainant sues a fictitious defendant, usually "John
Doe", and then issues a subpoena to make a net firm release the real name of
person behind the disputed postings.
When presented with a legal document most net firms will hand over details
of users and subscribers, he says.
"People rarely look at things like privacy policies," says Mr Godar, "and
most companies will have a specific exception which says if they are
compelled by law to hand over information they will do so."
The Recording Industry Association of America has used this willingness to
share subscriber information to gather details of users it considers to be
illegally sharing pop music.
Legal protection
Mr Galton's lawsuit has been launched to make Yahoo hand over more
information about people who posted the allegedly offensive messages.
He also alleges that Yahoo does nothing to give redress to people who have
suffered abuse via its message boards.
He is now urging others who have been the target of such attacks over the
past four years and made fruitless efforts to find out who posted messages
or get them removed to join him in a class action lawsuit.
One of the consequences of the publicity Mr Galton has received over the
lawsuit has been to have his e-mail address and telephone number posted to
message boards.
In many countries net firms are granted so-called "common carrier" or
"immunity from suit" status that removes their legal responsibility for what
their users do online.
However, this legal protection usually evaporates if a company is put on
notice about websites or messages that infringe laws but does nothing about
them.
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