Australia’s High Court held media responsible for comments posted under their Facebook posts on September 8. The highest court in the country upholds the decision taken by a New South Wales state court in June 2020. A simple defamatory Facebook comment under a media’s post could result in the media being sued.
Media call for change in legislation in Australia
The case dates back to 2017. An inmate of a juvenile detention center multiplying offenses had attracted media attention. Commenting on publications by an Australian press group, Fairfax, the young man was wrongly accused of serious crimes. Fairfax had been held responsible for its Facebook comments by the New South Wales State Courts. A decision against which mobilized, without success, several companies in the sector.
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According to the High Court, by creating a public page on Facebook and posting content on it, newspapers encourage the posting of comments. Directly affected, News Corps and others believe Australia must change its legislation to relieve them of this responsibility.
For News Corp Australia Executive Chairman Michael Miller, “ this underscores the need for urgent legislative reform and i call on australian attorneys general to tackle this anomaly and align australian law with that of comparable western democracies “. Projects in this direction are already under study in some states of the country.
The media consider that they are not the authors of the comments and cannot be aware of all the comments made in this space. In France, a Facebook comment published under the publication of a media outlet or any other page is the responsibility of its author. If the page is open to all or many users, it can be sued for public defamation.
Facebook, used to conflicts with local media, declined to comment on the decision of Australia’s highest court. The social network simply mentioned the change in its moderation policy which gives the possibility of deactivating comments. To the detriment of the promotion of content and advertising revenue specifies the American company.
Defamation, how is it elsewhere?
the Wall Street Journal, owned by News Corps, subject to the very liberal 1st Amendment of the US Constitution, considers Australia’s libel law too favorable to plaintiffs. The newspaper notes that in the United States the complainant must prove the defamatory nature of the content, in Australia the media must prove the veracity of his words.
In France the question falls under the law of July 29, 1881 on freedom of the press. According to French law, it is up to the media to prove the absence of defamation. In fact, the 1881 law is very protective for journalists thanks to several safeguards: a limitation period of three months, a strict procedure, the possibility for the journalist to assert the good faith of his work, judges specialized. In 2019, the government’s attempt to bring press offenses into common criminal law was seen as an attack on the freedom of the press by profession.
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