Earlier
this year, I filed a suit on behalf of one of my clients, who was active on
Facebook Social Media. He alleged that the content posted by the content
creator injured his reputation. Interestingly, the content creator used an
anonymous account to post the defamatory post. Being that the identity of the
creator is not known, I approached the High Court of Bayelsa State to obtain an
order of court ordering Facebook (Meta Platforms) to disclose the personal data
of the content creator, so as to enable my client proceed with any civil or
criminal suit against the content creator.
My argument
was based on the enabling provision of the NITDA Code of Practice and other
laws, including the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Part
of the arguments was on how Facebook Algorithms works through the platform’s
sharing feature which impacts greatly the spread of the unlawful content. I had
equally asked for the Uniform Resource Locator of the content to be made permanent,
and/or put in an electronic archive to be given to my client for the purpose of
the demonstration of digital evidence in a subsequent case. Reference was also
made to the digital footprint of the anonymous content creator, as part of the
evidence.
While
we await further action, it is important to note that that the name of the
content creator, and my client is omitted due to the subsisting order of the
court for disclosure.
Feel free to contact us for any social media law related matter. You can leave us a mail at:
acerlegalconsult@gmail.com
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