In an unprecedented ruling, Austria’s Supreme Court has ruled that social media users can commit a criminal offense by participating in a shitstorm, for example by sharing illegal false statements.
In a groundbreaking ruling in Austria, a Facebook user was sentenced to pay a fine of 3,000 euros for spreading illegal false statements during a shitstorm. This is reported by Tagesschau.
The user had shared a post that falsely accused a police officer of having thrown an 82-year-old man to the ground and interrogated him for hours. According to the Supreme Court, the defendant “accepted” “circulating a picture of the plaintiff without checking its veracity,” as Tagesschau quoted the verdict.
According to the news broadcast, the police officer in question was on duty at a demonstration by corona deniers in Tyrol in February 2021. Contrary to what circulated claims suggested, he did not violently bring an 82-year-old to the ground, make an arrest, or interrogate anyone.
During the demonstration, he was deployed as part of the cordon and was filmed doing so. According to the report, this video and the demonstrably false accusations were nevertheless shared on Facebook and triggered a wave of reactions, including many insulting and abusive comments.
According to the Tagesschau on ORF, Michael Rami, Austrian constitutional judge and media lawyer, explained the significance of the ruling: “You have to know: If you own a profile on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok or wherever, then you are liable for the content you distribute there. If someone blindly shares or distributes someone else’s content that violates the rights of someone else, then you are liable. And if you’re unlucky, you are even liable for all the non-material damage that resulted from the entire shitstorm.”
The verdict was passed in April, but the written reasoning has only now been made available. Ingrid Brodnig, an Austrian journalist and expert on online hate, hopes that the verdict will provide more information. She sees progress in this regard if people realize that “there are consequences if I publish illegal content during a shitstorm.”