Slashdot Mirror
Smearing Toddler Reputations Via Internet: Free Speech Or Extortion?
retroworks writes "Crystal Cox, a Montana woman who calls herself an 'investigative journalist,' was slapped with a $2.5-million judgment last year for defaming an investment firm and one of its lead partners. Cox had taken control of the Google footprint of Obsidian Finance and its principal Kevin Padrick by writing hundreds of posts about them on dozens of websites she owned, inter-linking them in ways that made them rise up in Google search results; it ruined Obsidian's business due to prospective clients being put off by the firm's seemingly terrible online reputation. After Obsidian sued Cox, she contacted them offering her 'reputation services;' for $2,500 a month, she could 'fix' the firm's reputation and help promote its business. The Forbes Article goes on to describe how she tried to similarly leverage attorneys and journalists reputations. Finding some of her targets were too well established in google rank to pester or intimidate, Cox moved to family members, reserving domain names for one of her target's 3-year-old daughter. Forbes columnist Kashmir Hill makes the case that this clearly isn't journalism, and establishes a boundary for free speech online."
How is this not libel/slander, which is not protected speech?
I think the key is that she offered to change it all for money. I think that's the part that should be illegal, not posting all that stuff in the first place. And threatening to post it unless you get money should be treated very similarly.
Lastly, this, in a small way, Google's fault. Their algorithm is fooled by stuff the human curating process would've had a much harder time being fooled by.
But I don't think we need any restraints on speech to handle this issue.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
I've never seen a case of where extortion was successfully defended by claiming freedom of speech. Anyone have any examples?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Unless there is derogatory content hosted on there with the intent of associating said content with said toddler, I'm not sold.
From TFA: "Perhaps due to the negative attention, Cox took down the content she had started publishing on the nataliarandazza.com site."
But smearing? Unless there is derogatory content hosted on there with the intent of associating said content with said toddler, I'm not sold.
Normally I would agree with you; however, considering Ms. Cox's prior attempts at blackmailing the child's father (among others, according to TFA), I think it's fair to say that the likelihood that harassment was her intent is pretty obvious.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
This isn't "rising up and protesting", this is one individual attempting to game the system to extort a company for lots of money.
This is the exact opposite of Internet protests such as those against SOPA, which involved hundreds of thousands of people fighting against corporate greed and government corruption. This case is just about an asshole who wants money.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Well duh. That boundary has existed for over 200 years. It's called libel (ruining a person's reputation through the written word).
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
"Free speech" doesn't mean "speech privileged from legal consequences."
I can't keep you from having a website because you're a scuzzy little libeler, but when you *do* libel me I sure as hell can go after you for that.
Free speech doesn't give you the right to slander someone. It doesn't give you the right to disclose trade secrets, or publish intimate details of private persons' lives. It doesn't give you the right to disclose sensitive national defense information, or incite immediate violence against somebody (Spike Lee needs to learn this).
What free speech amounts to is the right to say what you have to say then dare the government to do something about it. Surprised? Well, that's freedom for you. It doesn't come without *risk*.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
As a form of revenge, I'm been spamming the internet claiming she's a steroid-using track and field athlete from a decade ago.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
Of course doing either thing individually, asking for a dollar, or being a nuisance, is not illegal. The two, together, however, would be.
Of this is covered under the RICO act in which multiple acts committed over a certain time period is classified as special criminal activity. In this case it seems plausible that extortion and blackmail may have been committed, and so there may be an RICO violation. It seems that RICO may apply because the internet, like the telephone, is considered a interstate device.
I think anyone, not just journalist and bloggers, deserve the benefit of the doubt when reporting what can be broadly classified as defensible facts, or even opinions. Freedom of speech say that we can go out onto the public pulpit in the public space and say pretty much what we want. There should be few if any restrictions on this.
What triggers a regulatory environment is when we are directly paid for reporting these facts and opinions. In such cases some responsibility should be imposed. If you are paid a million dollars a week to state your opinion though a commercial enterprise, funded by ads on radio, tv, or even google, then those statement should undergo some scrutiny, even be liable to prosecution, because it plausible, even likely, you are being paid to mold commercial allegiances, which is not illegal in itself, but is regulated. I mean if it is illegal for me to make a commercial stating that you will get rich investing in gold(as opposed to saying that gold is rising, so buying gold could be a safe investment), then why is it okay for someone to spend three hours a day convincing the public that the most secure currency in the world is going to fall(inflation has not bee an issue and is not rising) and therefore the only safe thing to do is to call this company that will sell you overpriced gold, that may not even exist.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Right on.
WTF is up with the inflammatory headline: "Free Speech or Journalism"? Defamation, extortion, and libel is not now, and never has been, any kind of protected speech. It doesn't matter if you do it in your local newspaper, leaflets you hand out throughout the neighborhood, the corner soapbox, or a network of libelous websites.
Nope. This is "Nice place you have here... It would be a shame if something happened to it".
My wife doesn't listen to me either...
I had the dubious honor of having to deal with this piece of shit about two years ago.
Many years ago, I worked on a project called Movielink which was one of the first "download now, watch later" movie services, originally under the auspices of Sony Pictures. We launched a beta site in 2001, and I left to work on other projects.
Ten years later, I was contacted by one of the (ex) Sony Pictures folks, asking for help with a net stalker. All he had was a bunch of threatening emails, one of which had been sent from a standard mail client not Hush or a remailer. The IP was pretty easy, since it pointed to a group of properties (on one big plot) all owned by this Cox woman. (150 Grave Creek Rd, Eureka, MT 59917, 710 Grave Creek Rd, Eureka, MT 59917, 830 Grave Creek Rd Eureka, MT 59917) Once uncovered, she pulled out the stops and registered every possible permutation of my friend's name with "fuck" preceding or appended to each name. She must have registered fifty domains, and was making ridiculous claims about patent theft, and directly asking my friend for money to "shut down her investigative efforts."
We got lucky, I guess. In the cleartext email, she directly threatened my friend that she would "ruin him just for fun." Since she was in court with Obsidian, I wrote an amicus (jailhouse lawyer, remember? B) and promised I would send it to the Court and Obsidian's counsel the next day if she didn't transfer every domain with my friends name to him immediately. No threats. We never heard from her again, but every domain was transferred to my friend.
Her site still tops her own Google results. Why is this still a civil issue?
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."