ACS:Law Now Using Dubious Legal Theories To Threaten Slyck.com

from the keep-digging dept

Just last week, we were talking about how UK firm ACS:Law, who has been condemned by UK politicians and ISPs, was still pushing forward with its efforts to send out tens of thousands of threatening "pre-settlement" letters. These letters attempt to scare recipients into paying up to avoid a potential (though rarely filed) lawsuit claiming copyright infringement, based on quite weak evidence (an IP address collected by DigiProtect after DigiProtect purposely puts a file online). The whole thing has been called a "scam" by Lord Lucas in the UK, and lawyers at the firm that initiated this practice, Davenport Lyons (and who apparently provided ACS:Law with its original documents) were recently referred to a disciplinary committee by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority claim that it's also investigating ACS:Law, and they may now have one more thing to investigate. It appears that ACS:Law's latest move is to threaten the US-based blog Slyck.com with a defamation lawsuit, based on some of the comments in Slyck's forums. For a variety of reasons, this threat was entirely groundless. First, it seems that the comments in question were joking statements of opinion, rather than actual libel -- such as calling ACS:Law's plan a "wank plan." How is that libelous?

Second, of course, Slyck is based in New York, and is protected from defamation suits based on comments by its users thanks to Section 230 of the CDA. Furthermore, Slyck has even greater protections thanks to New York's own anti-libel tourism statute, the Libel Terrorism Protection Act, which makes libel lawsuits in foreign countries against US journalists unenforceable. The good folks at the EFF have stepped up to support Slyck in responding to ACS:Law, and it appears that, for the time being, ACS:Law has gone quiet.

Of course, in theory, ACS:Law could push forward against Slyck anyway, and could potentially win in the UK. But given the mass scorn being heaped upon ACS:Law right now in the UK, combined with a recent push in the UK to rewrite defamation laws to prevent these sorts of questionable lawsuits, if ACS:Law does decide to push forward, it may find that the backlash is a lot more damaging than some anonymous person in a forum calling its plan a wank plan.

Filed Under: copyright, defamation, libel tourism, section 230
Companies: acs:law, slyck

UK Sets Up A Panel To Review Libel Laws

from the about-time dept

For quite some time, we've been noting how ridiculous UK libel laws are (and, by the way, we still have not been sued by the person in the UK who insisted we had libeled her), and there have been ongoing efforts to change those laws. While it's not much, it's a start to find out that the UK government has set up a panel to review the law. Hopefully this isn't just a panel to make the issue go away. It does sound like a fairly comprehensive review, however. The panel is expected to present its findings in early to mid-March, with a plan to try to implement any recommendations relatively quickly.

Filed Under: defamation, libel, libel tourism, panel, uk

Libel Tourism Down Under: US Company Tries Suing UK Blogger In Australia For Libel

from the who-did-what-now-where? dept

We've covered how libel tourism has become a big problem, usually in the UK, where defamation laws are much more ridiculous. However, it seems (oddly) that one American company, Evony, has decided to take a UK blogger to court in Australia for libel, after being upset about what that blogger wrote about the company. Once again, to make this clear, it's a US company suing a UK blogger for libel... in Australia. This story originally came out last week (when a few of you submitted it), but I had hoped to wait for a hearing this past Monday determining if the case would go forward. However, it now appears that the hearing has been postponed until February because Evony changed lawyers.

Evony is apparently quite upset at the way blogger Bruce Everiss criticized some of its activities, even though plenty of others have been equally critical of Evony, its marketing practices and how the game itself works. Of course, the further Evony (formerly Civony) takes this whole thing, the more attention it will draw to its practices. It's hard to see how that is a sensible move. Whatever you might think of how Evony conducts its business, the way it conducts its legal campaigns seems reason enough to avoid having anything to do with the company.

Filed Under: australia, bruce everiss, libel, libel tourism
Companies: evony

Increasing Concern Of UK's Draconian Libel Laws And How They're Abused

from the time-to-fix-the-problem dept

As I mentioned, we've recently been threatened with a number of lawsuits. One of them is a threat from the UK -- despite the fact that we are not UK-based and have no UK presence or business operations. The concern, as with most legal threats against us, was due to a comment someone made, making fun of someone who, despite haven spoken critically of others, does not appear to like being spoken about critically. The comments in question are certainly not libelous in the US, but with UK defamation law being significantly more draconian, the upset person insists that the comments are, in fact, libel and that a lawsuit is the only proper response. I still think that, even under UK libel law, it would be a stretch to find these comments libelous and a lawsuit in the UK against us would be meaningless, but we requested that the lawsuit threat be removed, and the person not only refused, but suggested the plan was to move forward. When we suggested that such a lawsuit would certainly publicize both the ridiculousness of UK libel laws and how this particular person responded to a random anonymous comment from someone on a blog page, we were told that we were being "bullies" for mentioning that such a lawsuit might look bad for the person. I find it odd that someone who threatens to sue us would then call us a bully for suggesting why such a lawsuit might backfire. Isn't the bullying in threatening a lawsuit?

And, thus, we are left with serious consequences. We've discussed how these sorts of ridiculous libel cases in the UK are creating serious chilling effects for lots of people, and more and more folks are coming forward to point out that the UK really needs to change its laws. The latest is UK comic Dara O'Briain who is sounding the alarm against this "ridiculous system" which almost everyone has recognized is creating "libel tourism."

"The libel laws which were initially set up to protect the reputation of individuals at a time when companies weren't the entities they are now are being used by companies to essentially quash dissent and to destroy criticism.

"That's a major problem. Companies can basically bully people out of saying bad things about their products and services."

The good news is that these comments came at the launch of a campaign to reform the UK's defamation laws to fix its backwards system, which is based on a different time. Hopefully the campaign moves forward quickly -- and with any luck, the threatened lawsuit against us does not become an exhibit they can use in how ridiculous these laws have become.

Filed Under: defamation, libel tourism, reform, uk

Libel Tourism Case Dismissed Because Little Evidence Of UK Visitors Seeing The Article

from the nice-try dept

We've discussed how the UK is used for "libel tourism" quite frequently, since its libel laws are more draconian than elsewhere. Thus, if someone is upset about what someone else has said about them, they'll often file a lawsuit in the UK, arguing that because the content is available online, it's been "published" in the UK. Thankfully, the UK courts have been a bit better about cracking down on these sorts of cases when they're obviously frivolous. In one recent case, the court rejected the claim by noting that there was little evidence many people in the UK saw the article, which was published in a South African publication. Specific evidence over how many UK readers viewed that article were not provided, but log files showed that only a grand total of 65 readers viewed the article at all over the 2 months following publication (so you could even say that if all 65 were in the UK, the "damage" was pretty limited). But, the publication did show that its site normally gets about 6.79% of its visitors from the UK, which would translate to about 4 UK visitors -- not nearly enough to prove "publication" in the UK. It's good to see the UK courts being a bit more careful about these things, though it would still be much better if the UK updated its outdated libel laws to avoid this kind of lawsuit altogether.

Filed Under: libel tourism, uk