European Court of Human Rights declares making an Internet news portal liable for the offensive online comments of its readers was justified

The European Court of Human Rights has declared an Estonian Judgment as justified, that made an Internet news portal liable for the offensive online comments of its readers.

The Court held that the finding of liability by the Estonian courts was a justified and proportionate restriction on the portal's right to freedom of expression, in particular, because: the comments were highly offensive and the portal failed to prevent them from becoming public and profited from their existence. Though the portal had argued that an EU Directive on Electronic Commerce, as transposed into Estonian law, had made it exempt from liability, the Court found that it was for national courts to resolve issues of interpretation of domestic law, and therefore did not address the issue under EU law.

The court decided on a case-by-case basis according to the specific characteristics of the action, the judgment may nevertheless provide a basis for the extension of liability of platform operators, even in Germany, where monitoring and verifying tasks have so far been refused by the national Courts.

Dr. Robert Kazemi