First injunction served via social networking site
Solicitor and political blogger, Donal Blaney, of Griffin Law, has obtained a landmark order to stop an unknown individual impersonating him on Twitter. The order, which was served on the Twitter site, demands the anonymous Twitterer reveal their identity and stop posting as Donal Blaney.
Blaney, who runs a right-wing blog called Blaney’s Blarney, said the individual contacted him two days after the court order was served, and they have since agreed a four-figure settlement which will be paid to Help the Heroes, Blaney’s charity of choice.
The injunction, now known as “Blaney’s Blarny Order”, was granted on the basis the blogger had breached his copyright. Blaney used legal reasoning similar to that used in Clark v Associated Newspapers, where Conservative politician Alan Clark successfully sued the London Evening Standard for breach of copyright laws conferring a right not to have work falsely attributed to him as an author, and the law of passing off, after they published an article imitating his diary and News of the World column.
An Australian court recently allowed an order to be served on social networking site Facebook. In the US, Google was recently ordered to reveal the identity of an anonymous blogger.
“I acted for someone a month ago who was the victim of fake twitters, and it took Twitter a week to track the person down by their ISP address,” Blaney said.
“When I myself became a victim of an imposter, I decided to act. Since the order, I have been contacted by children’s charities wondering if this can help stop internet bullying.
“As far as I know, this is a world first. Hopefully, it will have some impact on bullies.”
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