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Court Orders Google To Reveal Identity Of Abusive Blogger

by Gopalan on Aug 20 2009 10:49 AM

The New York Supreme Court has ordered Internet giant Google to reveal the identity of an abusive blogger. It was ruling on a petition by Liskula Cohen, a former Vogue model who was vilified as 'skanky' (promiscuous and disgusting) and a ‘whore’ on Blogger.com.

The comments were posted under photographs of Liskula and a male friend.

Cohen contacted Google for the name of the blogger - but the company refused to handover the details, and she moved the court.

Judge Joan Madden rejected the blogger's claim that the blogs were a 'modern day forum for conveying personal opinions, including invective and ranting' and should not be treated as factual assertions.

Cohen has now discovered the woman who posted the vicious comments was an acquaintance.

She said the blogger was a woman she hadn't seen in about a year, but who was a regular fixture at dinners and parties.

'Thank God it was her and she's an irrelevant person in my life,' Cohen said.

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'She's just somebody that whenever I would go out to a restaurant, to a party in New York City, she was just that girl that was always there.'

Cohen said the words were defamatory, and harmful to her career. She told the court prospective clients would question her about the blog and what she was doing in the photos.

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She and her lawyer, Steven Wagner, said they are now planning a defamation suit against the blogger.

Google said it had complied with the ruling by supplying the blogger's IP and email addresses to Miss Cohen's lawyers. The blog was removed as soon as Miss Cohen took legal action.

Google said it sympathised with the victims of 'cyberbullying' but also respected privacy concerns.



Source-Medindia
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