Sender Information:
[Private]
Sent by: [Private]
[Private]
Boston, MA, 02108-310

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Answer: There are a wide variety of reasons why people choose to speak anonymously. Many use anonymity to make criticisms that are difficult to state openly - to their boss, for example, or the principal of their children's school. The Internet has become a place where persons who might otherwise be stigmatized or embarrassed can gather and share information and support - victims of violence, cancer patients, AIDS sufferers, child abuse and spousal abuse survivors, for example. They use newsgroups, Web sites, chat rooms, message boards, and other services to share sensitive and personal information anonymously without fear of embarassment or harm. Some police departments run phone services that allow anonymous reporting of crimes; it is only a matter of time before such services are available on the Internet. Anonymity also allows "whistleblowers" reporting on government or company abuses to bring important safety issues to light without fear of stigma or retaliation. And human rights workers and citizens of repressive regimes around the world who want to share information or just tell their stories frequently depend on staying anonymous – sometimes for their very lives.

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Answer: The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble..." The government (and states, under the Fourteenth Amendment) must meet a high level of scrutiny before restricting speech.

A hyperlinks refers to and describes the location of another Internet resource. The text of the hyperlink and the material linked to may be highly expressive. In addition, the act of linking to other websites may be likened to protected "assembly," or association with those sites.

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Answer: No. Under 47 U.S.C. sec. 230(c)(1): "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." This provision has been uniformly interpreted by the Courts to provide complete protection
against defamation or libel claims made against an ISP, message board or chat room where the statements are made by third parties. Note that this immunity does not extend to claims made under intellectual property laws.

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Answer: Libel is a defamatory statement expressed in a fixed medium, usually writing but also a picture, sign, or electronic broadcast. See What is the legal definition of defamation?

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Answer: As defined in Black's Law Dictionary (7th ed. 1999), disparagement is "A false and injurious statement that discredits or detracts from the reputation of another's property, product, or business. To recover in tort for disparagement, the plaintiff must prove that the statement caused a third party to take some action resulting in specific pecuniary loss to the plaintiff."

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Answer: When libel is clear on its face, without the need for any explanatory matter, it is called libel per se. The following are often found to be libelous per se:

A statement that falsely:

• Charges any person with crime, or with having been indicted, convicted, or punished for crime;
• Imputes in him the present existence of an infectious, contagious, or loathsome disease;
• Tends directly to injure him in respect to his office, profession, trade or business, either by imputing to him general disqualification in those respects that the office or other occupation peculiarly requires, or by imputing something with reference to his office, profession, trade, or business that has a natural tendency to lessen its profits;
• Imputes to him impotence or a want of chastity.

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Answer: The party making a defamation claim (plaintiff) must ordinarily prove four elements:

1. a publication to one other than the person defamed;
2. a false statement of fact;
3. that is understood as

a. being of and concerning the plaintiff; and
b. tending to harm the reputation of plaintiff.

4. If the plaintiff is a public figure, he or she must also prove actual malice.

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Answer: One who "publishes" a defamatory statement may be liable. However, 47 U.S.C. sec. 230 says that online service providers are not publishers of content posted by their users. Section 230 gives most ISPs and message board hosts the discretion to keep postings or delete them, whichever they prefer, in response to claims by others that a posting is defamatory or libelous. Most ISPs and message board hosts also post terms of service that give them the right to delete or not delete messages as they see fit and such terms have generally been held to be enforceable under law.

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Answer: Actual damages are damages awarded to a winning party to compensate them for a proven injury or loss; damages that repay actual losses.

Punitive damages are damages awarded in addition to actual damages when the defendant acted with recklessness, malice, or deceit. Punitive damages are intended to punish and thereby deter blameworthy conduct.

(Black's Law Dictionary)

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Answer: Personal liability is liability for which one is personally accountable and for which a wronged party can seek satisfaction out of the wrongdoer's personal assets. (Black's Law Dictionary)

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Answer: CyberSLAPP plaintiffs usually get the personal information you gave an ISP or online message board when you signed up (name, address, telephone number, etc.). Some web sites that host discussion boards might only have your e-mail address, in which case a second subpoeana to the ISP that hosts that address will reveal your identity. In many cases, even more detailed information about your use of the Internet can be obtained; it's important to realize that when you go online, you leave electronic footprints almost everywhere you go. (With advanced knowledge of the Internet, however, there are ways to cover your tracks.)

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Answer: No. The issuing of civil subpoenas is not monitored by the court handling the case. Under the normal rules of discovery in civil lawsuits, parties to a suit can simply send a subpoena to anyone they believe has information that could be useful. That information doesn't even have to be relevant to the lawsuit, as long as it could possibly lead to the discovery of relevant information. The only way that a court will evaluate an identity-seeking subpena is if either the ISP or the target of the subpoena files a motion asking the judge to block the subpoena. Unfortunately, in practice that rarely happens. That is because these subpoenas usually have a short, roughly 7-day deadline, and because many people never even find out that their Internet data has been subpoenaed.

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Answer: A subpoena is a formal demand that a person or company produce evidence in or for a civil or criminal lawsuit. A subpoena duces tecum (the kind most commonly used in John Doe cases) requires only the production of identified documents or categories of documents.

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Answer: Generally, defamation is a false and unprivileged statement of fact that is harmful to someone's reputation, and published "with fault," meaning as a result of negligence or malice. State laws often define defamation in specific ways. Libel is a written defamation; slander is a spoken defamation.

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Answer: Often called "CyberSLAPP" suits, these lawsuits typically involve a person who has posted anonymous criticisms of a corporation or public figure on the Internet. The target of the criticism then files a lawsuit so they can issue a subpoena to the Web site or Internet Service Provider (ISP) involved and thereby discover the identity of their anonymous critic. The concern is that this discovery of their identity will intimidate or silence online speakers even though they were engaging in protected expression under the First Amendment.