A federal appeals court ruled that a gossip website was not responsible for libelous content from an anonymous third party posting. The posting said a former Cincinnati Bengals cheerleader had sex with half the team and as a result had sexually transmitted diseases. The Communications Decency Act of 1996 protects websites from liability for content by third parties. The ex-cheerleader is planning to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case. (Cincinnati.com, June 17, 2014, by Amber Hunt)
The ACLU claimed the court decision was a victory for free speech in overturning a lower court decision finding that since the site encouraged negativity, it should be responsible for libelous statements. “We argued [in an amicus brief] this result was wrong and very dangerous for all kinds of valuable online speech, including online reviews and other consumer-driven sites. Think, for example, of a consumer protection website that encourages users to submit reports of defective products, or a website where users can share stories about companies filing aggressive ‘take-down’ letters demanding that speech be removed from the internet,” wrote Lee Rowland for the American Civil Liberties Union, June 16, 2014.