Liability Warning

[mahakavi]

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When a journalist writes something in a newspaper accusing somebody without evidence or write libelous material he can be sued in the court. Similar situation is applicable to the electronic media too, including internet online sites. Generally the disclaimer openly displayed in websites indicate that the opinions expressed by the members are their own and that the website has no responsibility over that. True. But let me point out what can go wrong.

1. You go into a hospital for a complicated surgery. Before the surgeon agrees to do the surgery, the hospital produces a sheaf of documents printed in standard legalese that the patient does not hold either the hospital or the surgeon responsible for a negative outcome. The patient has to sign it or else no surgery. Fine. Let us say the surgery goes through and something horribly goes wrong. There is a malpractice by the surgeon. Now the patient's lawyer will come into the picture. It does not matter what the patient signed. The lawyer will file a suit and let the court decide the matter notwithstanding the signed documents. Several cases in the last several years have ended up costing the hospital and the surgeon mega million dollars. Signed documents absolving the hospital and the surgeon are just papers.

2. There are some forums which promote music uploading by and for the members for their enjoyment. Some of them are in Chennai. I am a member in a couple of them. The members in the forum are warned not to upload copyrighted material into the servers of the website. The moderators keep an eye on that. Despite such warning and monitoring some uploads of copyrighted material occur. At that time the copyright owners inform the administrator of the violation. Immediately the admin removes those uploads. That is what it should be. As of now that is the current prctice.

Now once it happened in Mumbai where a person (who was a member of the forum) clandestinely recorded a live carnatic music concert and shared it with friends and bragged about it by calling and informing the musician who gave the concert. The next day the lawyers for the musician contacted the offender and threatened him with lawsuits with heavy financial cost. The person got scared and asked for forgiveness. The lawyers were gracious but told that person to post an apology (dictated and printed by the lawyers) in seven different music forums. We all got to read the extensive apology which was demeaning to the person. It was a lengthy apology asking for pardon on bended knees. Sure the person was humiliated and he disappeared from the forum in no time after that. He was let go rather easily. He could have been hauled into court.

Recently some musician (I won't name him) gave a concert in Chennai. Somebody recorded it and uploaded it into the website of this music forum. There is a Chennai recording company which had a contract with the musician to record it and sell the CDs. When they heard about this clandestine recording and upload, they threatened the music forum with a lawsuit since the forum is liable for hosting the music folder in their archives. The forum has a disclaimer "we are not responsible for the activities of our members". No sir, the lawyers threatened legal action on the forum. The forum buckled and immediately ordered the deletion of the music folder in question and offered profuse apology.

3. We are now coming to issues concerning libel. Let us say a forum like TB has a website which is hosted by a server in the US. The laws in the US are very specific regarding libel cases. If there was a libel attack on a person in a website which is hosted by a server located in the US, then the offended party can sue the offender in the US courts. The summons will go to the website administrator. The admin will then pass it on to the offender to handle the summons. That is not the end of it. The summons makes the website admin as a co-defendant if the admin has not taken any activity against the offender to dissuade him from his act or if they fail to ban the member concerned. There are some US cases pending currently in that regard.

Just thought that members in this forum must be aware of such activities.

 

[renuka]

3. We are now coming to issues concerning libel. Let us say a forum like TB has a website which is hosted by a server in the US. The laws in the US are very specific regarding libel cases. If there was a libel attack on a person in a website which is hosted by a server located in the US, then the offended party can sue the offender in the US courts. The summons will go to the website administrator. The admin will then pass it on to the offender to handle the summons. That is not the end of it. The summons makes the website admin as a co-defendant if the admin has not taken any activity against the offender to dissuade him from his act or if they fail to ban the member concerned. There are some US cases pending currently in that regard.

Just thought that members in this forum must be aware of such activities.

Dear Mahakavi,

I would like some clarification here.
You see technically none of us really know each other.
We are Username and Password out here.

Summons can only be issued under situations where the offended party is known at least by a full name.

How can a summon for example libel attack be issued when the offended party is not even known to anyone but remains a username and password.


My next question:

Just say A sends B a private message in a forum.
and A and B have a clash of words(has happened many times to many of us)
That was not made public and the fight remained just with A and B..no one got to know about this..so how can A and B claim libel when no damage to reputation was made known to the whole world.

You see you might say that the Forum stores all data..yes true but unless there is evidence that this stored data is made known to all other members only then legal action can be taken isn't it?

Can you kindly clear my doubts cos I do like legal discussions too.

I am glad you are doing service to us here by making us legally aware.
As a medical personnel..medico legal issues are of great importance.

Of late I have noted that some patients are actually keeping their handphone cameras on when they are in my room.
It is hard to accuse anyone of anything but when I see or suspect that..I just hardly talk much so that they can't use anything againts me the next time.

Out here it is getting hard to tell patients to switch off handphones cos they get angry if we tell them to do so.

 

[renuka]

Dear Mahakavi,

I have one more question:

Just say someone managed to get our personal email from another person and strikes up a friendship with us.
Ok friendship was going fine and till one day when both parties start fighting like cats and dogs and accuse each other of horrible stuff.

ok just say its A and B.
Once upon a time friends and now they are Fiends(enemies)
Can A still sue B or B still sue A citing that they are using Yahoomail or Googlemail cos Yahoo and Google also do store all data in their Server and Archives.

So going by the logic you had given that a Private Message from Forum is through the Forum Server hence stored in the Forum and hence a Public Message...that means every email via Google or Yahoo is also Public isn't it?

Can you kindly shed some light on this please?

 

[renuka]

One more question here:

Forum gives up an option to edit data in the stipulated period of time for example a typo.(I am not talking about abusive posts here).

So happened the pre edited post landed in a persons inbox in his personal email via yahoomail for example.

Ok then the person goes back to forum..writes in forum some post qouting the pre edited post.

You see here the person is using the service of two service providers.

Quoting the pre edited post sent by the forum through his inbox via yahoo mail.

Ok what I want to highlight is:

1)If the person wants to reply a post quoting the pre edited post that means he should only reply via his yahoo email.

2)The fact that the person chose to log into forum which has the edited post but yet chooses to quote the pre edited post that means he has committed an "offence".
If he has chosen to use Forum as a mode to reply the post he should only quote the edited post.

If he wants to use the pre edited post that came to his inbox via yahoomail that means he should reply using only his yahoomail and not go through forum.

and if the person does not have the personal email of the individual he wishes to reply quoting the pre edited post that means all he can do is :

Have the right to remain silent!!

 

[mahakavi]

Renuka:
You are asking honest questions, so I will answer them honestly.
1. As for overcoming username anonymity, no problem. The first step would be to issue a summons to the website admin. Once all the relevant posts by the offender are made available to the lawyer, the lawyer will get the court to issue a subpoena to the admin to release the identity of the offender (name, email address or other information in the profile of the person stored in website server). The admin cannot refuse if the subpoena comes from a court. If he does refuse an arrest warrant will be issued. This has happened in the US so many times. For example the internal emails from some of the financial outfits which went under gobbling customer funds is just one example. The court's reach is phenomenal. Until the full name of the offender and their location is available they will be identified as offender #1 (similar to witness #9 in the Pennstate ex-football (assistant) coach who is on trial. Also a poster's identity can be found including his location (full address) by knowing the IP (Internet Portal) address of the poster which can be easily extracted. The FBI did one such at one time and located a fraudster in Atlanta while he was using his computer. Even if the person uses a public computer in an office they can trace who all used that computer at what time and all that. We also have time registered in the posts made here.

2. If A and B had private exchange of emails and libel was committed the same method can be used by going through the IP of the two. If one did not use the four-letter word while the other was very liberal with them (as we have seen here) that is grounds for libel action.

Let us say there are many posts posted in the forum containing libelous material. That is public info. As I said in the other thread, even if you delete the offensive words later the edited post goes into another area of the computer and the unedited message is still there somewhere and it can be retrieved by techies. Before editing the message is known to all (and after editing too). On top of that if the messages were all stored in somebody else's computer they will form the basis for further investigation. The offended person cannot edit the messages to his satisfaction (to twist the arguments) because they will be compared against those in the server. If it turns out the offender seriously manipulated the messages to his whims then he will be in trouble. In addition, as I pointed out in the chinese thread, the offender incriminated himself that he deliberately used the offensive words that particular post is public information. Go back and read the sequential posts in the chinese thread. It will be obvious.

I took some law courses as part of my MBA study here in the US. So I know some aspects of personal law, corporate law etc.

As for your patients you better be extra-careful. Never speak ill of them even if they do not follow your instructions. They can record both video and audio in their cameras. These days camera phones can capture any action that could be used later in a court. Remember some of the uprisings in the Arab Spring and the Libyan struggles were all transmitted by cell phone videos throughout the world. So when you deal with your patients be professional ( no small talk or jokes either because they can be used against you if needed). Touch them in a professional (not personal) manner to examine them. I don't want to sound alarmist but you never know which patient can turn against you. Majority of them are normal folks wanting to get well and go home. The so-called litigation of medical issues has become a disease in the US and that is now getting transmitted across the world, especially the developing nations which are very quick to adopt all the bad habits of the west.

The reasons for that are two-fold. 1. The trial lawyers stand to make a killing in that route. 2. The doctors are also getting more and more unethical. I touch upon these issues in my essays in facebook. For example we have a Dr. Drew radio show who for years promoted the drugs (such as wellbutrin) of GSK and took some $300,000 for that service from GSK. There are other cases where the clinical researchers write promotional articles on drugs (say in JAMA or NEJM) and the lesser medical folks buy into such articles. My own primary care physician (until 4 years ago) kept pushing me into avandia (a GSK drug) even after I told him about the detailed study a few years ago on its ill-effects by researchers in University of North Carolina, at Chapel Hill. GSK even tried to get that faculty member, responsible for the research , fired by talking to the chairman of the department. Fortunately the chairman refused and now that faculty member is the chairman. The reason I mention all this is that unethical conduct in the medical profession and collusion between drug companies and physicians are very rampant nowadays.

We have a proverb in Thamizh. பனை மரத்தடியில் நின்று கொண்டு பால் குடித்தாலும் பார்ப்பவர்கள் கள் என்றே கூறுவர். So it is not only important to be ethical but also appear so (perception matters more than reality)

 

[mahakavi]

Dear Mahakavi,

I have one more question:

Just say someone managed to get our personal email from another person and strikes up a friendship with us.
Ok friendship was going fine and till one day when both parties start fighting like cats and dogs and accuse each other of horrible stuff.

ok just say its A and B.
Once upon a time friends and now they are Fiends(enemies)
Can A still sue B or B still sue A citing that they are using Yahoomail or Googlemail cos Yahoo and Google also do store all data in their Server and Archives.

So going by the logic you had given that a Private Message from Forum is through the Forum Server hence stored in the Forum and hence a Public Message...that means every email via Google or Yahoo is also Public isn't it?

Can you kindly shed some light on this please?

I am not an expert on minute details of such cases. I guess you are confusing between email service providers and public forums. In the case of email outfits they act as agents for tansmission. They are not responsible for the content except when they turn a blind eye to certain pornographic content or some political revolution ( as happened in China when China served notice on Google to let the government know certain facts which they wanted). The public forums have an obligation to monitor the activities of the members in an overall sense (that is why there is a monitor and they have a report abuse button). If some infraction occurs and the website does not act even though it was reported to them, then they are liable. The liability of Google/Yahoo is much more general so long as they comply with government rules. They have to follow various government rules and country laws. The public forums like thamizh maiyam, thamizh hindu and several others like those have an obligation to act. That is all.

Again you are saying it is a private message. It was intended for the general audience but was withdrawn at a later time. In the intervening time the server transmitted that to all parties interested in that thread. My guess is if you have posted once in a thread you are an interested party in that thread. I am sure you would have got the message that I got too because the alert is instantaneous even before the person has a chance to edit. I don't know specific details regarding that since I an not a techie in that area.

 

[mahakavi]

One more question here:

Forum gives up an option to edit data in the stipulated period of time for example a typo.(I am not talking about abusive posts here).

So happened the pre edited post landed in a persons inbox in his personal email via yahoomail for example.

Ok then the person goes back to forum..writes in forum some post qouting the pre edited post.

You see here the person is using the service of two service providers.

Quoting the pre edited post sent by the forum through his inbox via yahoo mail.

Ok what I want to highlight is:

1)If the person wants to reply a post quoting the pre edited post that means he should only reply via his yahoo email.

2)The fact that the person chose to log into forum which has the edited post but yet chooses to quote the pre edited post that means he has committed an "offence".
If he has chosen to use Forum as a mode to reply the post he should only quote the edited post.

If he wants to use the pre edited post that came to his inbox via yahoomail that means he should reply using only his yahoomail and not go through forum.

and if the person does not have the personal email of the individual he wishes to reply quoting the pre edited post that means all he can do is :

Have the right to remain silent!!

You are getting personal here. I will just say this much. The pre-edit post was transmitted to interested parties --let us say via whichever email facility that was provided by the member. The message in your inbox says, "dear so and so, such and such a person has made a post that is of interest to you in the thread such and such. That can be accessed via the link xxxxxxxxxxxxx. Then it contains the text of the message and finally there is the electronic signature of the forum. It also specifically instructs you "not to reply to this email because it will not go to the person you intend to sent" because it comes from a server and you can access that message only by going to the forum site. Got it? Go and take a look at your messages from the forum. You will know what I am saying.

On your point (2) I don't remember what it is. But if you don't do it right away and reply later while you are in that thread without going through that original email link then you do quote it because it still is not a private message. The server serves the public domain forum. It uses the gmail/yahoomail to reach you. The person is not obligated to look for the edited post when the quote is casual. Then if the person who edited the post responds by saying that he/she has edited the post the receiver can acknowledge it and move on unless the pre-edit post contained abusive language at which time the pre-edit poster cannot say that he/she did not send it.

If you continue along this line I will invoke my right not to further this correspondence because I don't have infinite patience.

 

[renuka]

You are getting personal here. I will just say this much.

Dear Mahakavi,

I do not see is as personal cos no name was mentioned in the post.
It was an honest question pertaining to a situation that's all.
After all we are discussing situations here isn't it?

After all you yourself in post #5 mentioned this:

. In addition, as I pointed out in the chinese thread, the offender incriminated himself that he deliberately used the offensive words that particular post is public information. Go back and read the sequential posts in the chinese thread. It will be obvious.

You have used the word OFFENDER when the fact remains anyone is INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY.
So I guess the word Offender is not the correct choice here.


BTW the reason I asked you the question is becos you are well informed on legal matters and I was highly impressed that you have sound knowledge in medical and even legal fields.

My compliments to you.

Anyway as I said anyone has the right to remain silent and if you are citing limited patience as a reason I can truly understand you.

Peace upon you.

 

[renuka]

Dear all,

We have to remember that the law is the law..there can not be one law for you and one law for me syndrome.
Seen this happen many times in forum before.

 

[renuka]

The person is not obligated to look for the edited post when the quote is casual.

Really?

 

[mahakavi]

No further comment as I said earlier.

 

[praveen]

If you are threatening legal action against the site or myself, i am really amused. You are simply and massively blowing up a tiny, trivial issue.

to clarify a few portions

Then it contains the text of the message and finally there is the electronic signature of the forum. It also specifically instructs you "not to reply to this email because it will not go to the person you intend to sent" because it comes from a server and you can access that message only by going to the forum site. Got it? Go and take a look at your messages from the forum. You will know what I am saying.

But if you don't do it right away and reply later while you are in that thread without going through that original email link then you do quote it because it still is not a private message. The server serves the public domain forum. It uses the gmail/yahoomail to reach you. The person is not obligated to look for the edited post when the quote is casual. Then if the person who edited the post responds by saying that he/she has edited the post the receiver can acknowledge it and move on unless the pre-edit post contained abusive language at which time the pre-edit poster cannot say that he/she did not send it.

This becomes the responsibility of the people who are in the discussion. There is no option that i am aware of where each and every edit is emailed. This would cause a email flood and the site email's would have been blocked.

It is the responsibility of the person to review what has been posted and then act on it. Not based on something that was posted and then edited.

It happens a lot. A person posts something and then decides he is better off posting it in a different way, so he edits it. Simple.

This is commonsense. 95% of the time people click reply and type their message and send it across. This comes to me. This is not a Yahoo Groups setup where people can reply and then the message is added to the discussion. This is a forum where ppl need to be on the site to reply.

This topic does not need an discussion. If you do not like things here, please leave.

thread closed. and