Court Protects Web Site Operators From Acting in ‘Noxious’ Oversight Role
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic (MFIA) at Yale Law School filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the case. While defamatory or other actionable speech may allow for the unmasking of an online speaker, EFF and MFIA argued that the First Amendment requires a heightened standard for unmasking anonymous speakers in order to protect robust debate — political or otherwise.
“We are pleased that the Court of Appeals overturned the trial court’s troubling decision,” said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Matt Zimmerman. “The First Amendment provides robust protection for controversial and critical speech. This case demonstrates that critics of political figures and others with power may find themselves on the receiving end of retaliatory legal threats. Today’s opinion shows that Illinois courts will defend speakers engaged in lawful speech from improper efforts to ‘out’ them.”
The anonymous critic in this case commented on a story on the website of a suburban Chicago newspaper called the Daily Herald, and engaged in a heated debate with other commenters – including the son of the village trustee candidate in Buffalo Grove, Illinois, who was discussed in the article. The candidate, Lisa Stone, who eventually won her race, asked a state court to order the newspaper to release the critic’s name and address without appropriately showing that the statements directed towards her son were defamatory or otherwise illegal. Last year, a lower court granted Stone’s pre-lawsuit request for her critic’s identity, incorrectly holding that a narrow disclosure to Stone would adequately protect the speaker’s First Amendment rights. More
