Cyber-defamation and Why You Shouldn’t Do It
In 2014, Cynthia had some plastic surgery done. For whatever reason she wasn’t satisfied and took to Google reviews to lash out at the surgeon. But she went a bit too far. Specifically, she alleged that he had charged her for work that he didn’t do and that he had been incompetent in a procedure which had not occured. In other words, she lied about both, on the internet.
In the first week after the postings, traffic to the doctor’s website fell off by almost a quarter. Gossip started, and not surprisingly, the surgeon felt distress and embarrassment, even though he knew the allegations were false. He lost business, he lost sleep, and most of all he lost reputation.
Not surprisingly, the doctor commenced a lawsuit. Again not surprisingly, the doctor won an award of A$530,000 plus legal costs.
Defamation has long been a compensable tort and many a loudmouth has been made to pay for oral or written untruths. While the internet has been (and remains) a bit of a Wild West, the rules are slowly but surely finding and punishing the libelists and slanderers on the World Wide Web.
It’s only human nature to want to lash out if we feel we’ve been done wrong, and the internet makes it all too easy. At your keyboard in the quiet of your study you may feel completely insulated from the real world, able to say and do as you please. That’s just an illusion, and the real world recipient of your untrue venom can turn to a real world court and make you pay real world damages. And for most of us, A$530,000 plus costs would put quite a dent in our retirement savings. That’s a very real world.
Remember what your mother used to tell you? “If it’s not true, don’t say it.” Well, your mother was right, especially about online postings.