I have always wondered about my legal rights and responsibilities as a blogger. Our tech-culture is based around the rapid universal exchange of information. Sometimes this information is fact, sometimes it’s opinion. For our readers, this line between fact and opinion is often blurry, since a portion of them reach our sites after searching for the answer to a question. This scenario is creating questions by concerned bloggers regarding their legal responsibility for the information they put out for the public. I began to ponder this subject so I turned to my trusty search engine and started inputting some terms. After some searching to no avail, I switched up my keywords and I came across this article over at Lawfuel that states:

“The importance of individual responsibility in posting messages online was raised further last month following the conviction of a blogger in Flintshire, Wales, who posted offensive messages about a police officer’s new-born baby and wrote about his perceived mistreatment at the hands of the police and Crown Prosecution Service. He was prosecuted under the Telecommunications Act, relating to the sending of an electronic message”

While reading this scenario I’m sure everyone assumed that there would be some sort of punishment at the hands of the police for this kid. Duh. It is a pretty serious situation to write about a police officer and his child on the internet. But what about situations that aren’t as blatantly malicious. We must keep in mind that any one of us can come under fire for content we post that we think is not that serious or offensive. For this reason, you should play it safe. Look at some of these categories, steer clear of them, and happy blogging!

“User Generated Content: Some of the legal pitfalls:

Defamation: This country has tough libel laws and from the earliest Web 1.0 bulletin boards posters have got into difficulty with defamatory comments - as have the online services that carry them.
Offensive Messages: There are a range of laws from the Protection from Harassment Act to specific restrictions in the Telecommunications Act that can be invoked.
Incitement: There have been high profile cases relating to terrorism but any encouragement of others to commit unlawful acts can result in prosecution.
Intellectual property: There is a copy and paste culture online, but using other people’s material (whether it’s an article, photograph, logo or even another blog posting) can cause problems.
Linking: Bloggers need to think about what is on their own site, but also keep an eye on the links they provide to other pages e.g. to offensive or illegal material.
Reporting: The law of contempt and other statutory reporting restrictions carry strict penalties if breached.
Corporate blogging: The legal pitfalls can be even more pronounced in the case of corporate blogs where additional commercial concerns will apply.”

If you want to take a look at the whole article, check it out.

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