Slashdot Mirror
What Should You Do When Attacked Online?
Argylengineotis asks: "Recently, a friend of mine was viciously attacked by an unknown third party over the internet. This is not a typical case of cyber-crime either: the attack is in the form of slander, libel and posting of private information in public forums with the intent of encouraging further harassment. On top of everything, this attack is focused on forcing my friend out of business! Though we suspect certain people of perpetrating this series of crimes, the only way our friend could prove anything is with the resources of certain server logs belonging to the forum where this attack is taking place. This puts the forum in an awkward position, as they don't want to jeopardize their common-carrier status by setting a precedent of forking over server logs when somebody says something someone else doesn't like, be it overly critical or potentially slanderous, and they've referred my friend to their lawyers. My pal's local police force is totally unsympathetic and ultimately incapable of dealing with something like this, and the FBI won't even take a report, because there are no concrete points where there is verifiable damage, just a few mean-spirited posts in an anonymous forum. What, if any, are other possible recourses in a situation like this? Should my friend somehow try to find the money to hire an attorney to try and get the server logs (if they even exist)? Should my friend try and take matters into his own hands, (vigilantism)? Is there anyone we can call or write to that can exert some justice? Or does my friend simply have to resign himself to being the victim of a pretty nasty smear campaign?"
Slander/libel isn't a crime it's an actionable civil offense, where the remedy is financial. Why money? That's all courts can deal in. They cannot restore reputation nor return the goose feathers to the opened pillow (as they say).
But, a large civil judgement is only possible when (1) the litigant doesn't fight the charge--not what you want to have happen, or (2a) cannot use the unassailable defense of "truth", and (2b) cannot prove they were ignorant of the falsehood of their accusation, and (2c) cannot prove they acted without malice or an intent to cause harm through the false accusations. In other words: libel cases are rarely won, but when they are won (outside of summary judgement) they speak volumes -- especially when the award is high.
So, in light of libel and slander, you can refute (but who listens? Bad news is exciting), ignore (and appear guilty), or litigate. Just be sure you can make the case.
Oh, expect it to be expensive.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Online forum? He can post well reasoned, sane replies to the same forum. Anyone who goes to the trouble of reading the forum will run across them and be able to make up their own mind.
Unless your friend has the money and desire to pursue this legally, outside of the internet, then the only way to fight 'public' slander, libel, abuse, etc, is to present yourself in that 'public' forum, and let the readers know who you really are.
But, quite frankly, it sounds like this is a small time deal, and I bet the only thing impacted will be your friend's pride.
Of course, you're asking slashdot. I mean, really, all we can do is stroke your ego by saying insipid things like, "Dude, you are so right to toast him!"
As with all things in life, this too shall pass.
-Adam
demand the posts be taken down from the site where they were posted. It is illegal for a site to refuse to remove personal information which was posted without permission. There are no legal loopholes around this.
Some sites, such as slashdot, refuse to take down any posts, but a simple legal letter from a lawyer will quickly change anyones mind.
good luck!
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
(1) Forums/websites etc. are not nearly as immune from discovery (the formal process of discovering information) as they like to pretend. For instance, a recent decision by the Virginia Supreme Court held that AOL is not immune from a subpoena issued by a California court in a libel case.
(2) In order to get discovery from the forum, you will need to initiate a lawsuit. There are two ways you can go. If you have a reasonable idea of who the perpetrator is, you can sue them on theory alone. If you have no idea of the actual identity, you can bring a "John Doe" suit, and then seek third-party discovery to uncover the identity of the defendant.
(3) You need a lawyer to do any of this. Depending on where you are, the severity of the attack, the potential damages, and the ability to easily reach the suspected perpetrator, you may be able to find an attorney to handle this on a contingency basis. Unfortunately, because libel cases are notoriously hard to win, and don't usually pay a lot in damages, this may be very difficult.
(4) if you have business insurance you should check if it covers this type of claim.
A closing point: I have said before that the popularity of the internet didn't alter the fundamentals of libel and slander. It is cases like these (taking the poster at face value) that demonstrate what I mean. Just because the actionable speech is in an online forum instead of in a newspaper, or on the radio doesn't mean that it is fundamentally different than those media. On the flip side, there are significant protections built into the U.S. libel law, and those protections generally discourage all but the most serious and meritorious suits.
Good luck with you problem. It would be interesting to hear greater detail (what forum? what type of business? etc.).
automandc
I'm a lawyer with excellent karma. Something's gotta be wrong.
What Should You Do When Attacked Online?
1) Wonder WHY someone would attack you. Is it plain vandalism, or are you in some kind of business which make people angry (politics, weaponery, multinational), or you may live in a country that makes people angry (iraq, usa, israel, taiwan,...)
2) Talk to you opponents, or if you can't reach them, someone representative for their opinion. Convince them with sound arguments that they're doing the wrong thing, listen to their explanation of why they think you're doing the wrong thing. Ie. Communicate. This crucial stage solves 90% of the problems people tend to have.
3) Adopt to your new understanding of the situation, and see what happens. Stay calm, be patient. Remember that your life isn't on the line (yet).
4) If none of the above work leave some common sense out: switch to diplomacy, laws, threats, or technological defenses. (Note however, that more agressive tactics don't necessarily tackle the remaining 10% of the problems, but rather 10% of 10%.)
5) Wait for a totalitarian system of corporate control to take care of all of our daily lives, as well as those of our attackers.
--
Just my $0.02 as a hippie
Maybe see if Wired Patrol can help?
What a pathetically overly legalistic society we live in these days. The party here may in fact be guilty of libel, slander, or some other offense, but there's something the defamed can do other than sue.
He can GROW UP and handle some immature bozo who bothers him in online forums like a man. It's an online service, and people know that anything said must be taken *cum grano salis*, particularly when said by someone who's being a jerk via anonymous harassment. If an online kook can cause real damage to this person's business by posting nonsense on online forums, then quite frankly it wasn't much of a business to start with.
At the risk of being flamed for not jumping to the defense of the wronged party, people really need to grow up and learn that fretting over online kooks causes infinitely more harm than the kooks themselves can usually perpetrate.
Look at me, for example. As a writer I did investigative journalism into the world of online child pornography, and because I took positions such that the producers of hardcore materials should be more aggressively sought while the downloaders should largely be left alone because the manpower is being wasted, and that Playboy-like softcore materials being produced in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet states are most likely harmless and may serve as a release valve for the sexual desires of borderline pedophiles, I managed to accumulate some kooks of my own.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with my assessment of the situation after doing legitimate and careful journalistic research by interviewing people involved in the trade of such electronic material, as well as law enforcement and legislative officials, one can probably agree that I wouldn't deserve to be harassed and even threatened online for a very long time. Yet I was, for merely expressing an opinion. One of a few kooks I accumulated followed me around to several different forums, including ones where I used my real identity. Did he cause harm to my reputation? Maybe, but anyone who'd take a kook or troll's commentary to heart is a moron in the first place. Did he cost me online contacts? Again, maybe. Did he threaten me and know my real identity? Yes. Did he post personal information on public forums? Yes. Did he commit libel? Sure. Did I sue him? Of course not--why would any rightminded individual bother?
What did I do? I stopped responding, went about my business, and he went away. In other words, I acted like a man instead of bringing lawyers into it like a whiny little pussy. Quite frankly, people need to just grow up about such matters instead of fattening the attorneys.
But most importantly, people should be mature enough not to be bothered by online kooks in the first place. Everyone has enemies. That's just life. Just don't let the bastards get you down. Nothing is as harmful as one's own worries.
Chasing Amy
(We all chase Amy...)
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws"-Tacitus
IAAL, but no expert on this stuff. I can however agree that libel is a "disfavored action" which kinda means it pisses courts off and is difficult to win. Often a libel action results from a childish squabble, and sometimes it implicates free speech interests.
However, what the poster describes is much more worrisome because of the implied threat to his business and his privacy. This implicates additional torts such as interference with business relations, invasion of privacy, any monetary damages resulting from same, etc. which are much more readily actionable. If an action is begun, the plaintiff will have access to discovery, subpoena, etc. (Some of these claims may have criminal analogs, which may not get the DA excited but may help the harasser to sober up.) The ISP might oppose a subpoena, but probably won't.
In any event, anticipate spending thousands on litiagtion, or representing yourself and spending hundreds of hours on it.
It's an uphill battle, and probably not worth undertaking because of the costs and your ulcers. It would be important to objectively assess what threat this person poses, as opposed to how personally upsetting their actions are. It sucks, but one hopes your customers or business partners are smarter than to rely on something they heard from some anonymous person on a newsgroup.
My sympathies, I'm sure it hurts. But you may do well enough posting calm denials, or ignoring the person altogether. You might also -enjoy- a little informal detective work to determine who the person is (lure them into the open), but don't retaliate in kind or piss the person off even more.
For a journalist, this seems a remarkably naive attitude. Have you never seen the effect of a rumour? The original source may be a known idiot, but once it gets a couple of steps away, people of some standing may start hearing it. Information has a way of getting laundered, like money, and pretty soon "everybody knows" that you put gerbils up your ass or whatever, without anybody really knowing where they heard it.
Besides, I'm not at all sure that using the law isn't a mature approach. It certainly beats going after the guy with a baseball bat, for instance, even though that's a long-standing manly approach, and it may be more effective than simply ignoring the problem and hoping that it will go away, or at least that he will get bored and move on to someone else. Litigation has a bad reputation, and obviously it can be abusive, but it's also a process of submitting a dispute to a disinterested third party.
Now me, I've got no reputation to speak of, so don't bother. People already hide their gerbils when they see me. :)
This next song is very sad. Please clap along. -- Robin Zander
He can GROW UP and handle some immature bozo who bothers him in online forums like a man. It's an online service, and people know that anything said must be taken *cum grano salis*, particularly when said by someone who's being a jerk via anonymous harassment.
Didn't the poster say he was going to lose his business.
Sounds like you're the one who needs to grow up and realize that not *all* lawsuits are brought by whiny babies. That sometimes, in fact, there is good reason for a court to muzzle a defendent and fine him for his actions.
If the defendent really is putting this guy out of business with lies, this is one of those cases.
He can GROW UP and handle some immature bozo who bothers him in online forums like a man.
I think this is a bit overly harsh, but I do agree that litigation should be a last resort. A much better plan is to agressively RESPOND. The best counterattack to inaccurate speech is accurate speech. Trust your audience. Most people recognize a creep when he's called on it.
Make a website and post the correct responses to all of the inaccuracies and lies that the anonymous coward is spreading. Do it in the form of an FAQ. Restate his assertions in question form, answer them. Ask your own question, answer them. The go to EVERY forum where the lies have been posted and post the link with a brief statement and put him on the defensive.
Be sure to pose questions back to the originator:
Q: Why does John Doe post anonymously?
A: He knows what he is saying is false and he doesn't want to associate his name with his pretended beliefs.
Q: Why does he post my private information?
A: He doesn't want a battle of ideas, but rather a battle of cheap shots.
Q: Why does he keep repeating lie X, when the truth is Y?
A: Because he doesn't care about the truth, but instead wants the negative effect of deceitful propaganda.
Q: Who is John Doe? What is his agenda?
A: He may be a crackpot. He may work for one of my competitors. He may be an ex-girlfriend. He may be mentaly ill. We don't know because he posts anonymously. We don't really know anything about him other than he likes to spew anonymous attacks. He clearly has an agenda to try to damage my business through lies and deceipt.
Q: How credible is John Doe?
A: He spews anonymous attacks and won't respond to the truth. I put my name on my work and my communications. You be the judge who is more credible.
You get the idea.