The realm of social media liability has been a relatively untouched legal subject up until a recent landmark case in the Supreme Court of New South Wales. The case of Voller v Nationwide News Pty Ltd; Voller v Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd; Voller v Australian News Channel Pty Ltd [2019] NSWSC 766 held that three media companies were classed as the ‘publishers’ of comments made by the public on their Facebook posts for the purposes of a defamation class.
The three companies typically used their facebook page to disseminate links to news stories, which would also invite the public to leave comments on their public facebook page or their respective news website. Liability in defamation arises because the actual publication of the material is defamatory in nature, and ‘publication’ occurs when the material is delivered to the public. In this case, the Court found that ‘publication’ only occurs in respect of the comments when the comment is placed in a form that is easy to understand and able to be viewed by the public, which is done by the owner of the facebook page as opposed to the actual author of the comments. [...]
