Online defamation has always been about two issues: there’s the legal question of whether the online comments are “defamatory” according to the standard legal tests, but before you get to that stage, you need to know who is writing the defamatory comments.

That’s often where the inquiry starts and stops. Since online anonymity is so hard to pierce, the identity of the poster of defamatory comments is never known, and the person who is defamed has no-one to sue for defamation.  A court order on Monday has shed some light on the process of getting over that anonymity hurdle.  In the case of Cohen v. Google Inc., Index No. 100012/09 (N.Y. Co. August 17, 2009) (Madden, J., J.S.C.) (related story), a Canadian model has obtained an order compelling Google to disclose the identity of the author of the alleged defamatory comments.  “Pre-complaint disclosure” is not new, but this case has attracted attention because of the elements: a New York model, Google, and blogging.

In Canada, similar orders have been made in online defamation cases. In a 2009 decision in the case of Warman v. Fournier, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ordered the disclosure of all personal information, including name, email and IP address, of eight anonymous posters in a defamation case.

Calgary – 14:00 MST