The American Civil Liberties Union (“ACLU”), which was involved
in constructing arguments put forward in the case, details the
process as follows:
"...the court should require the plaintiff
to attempt to notify the anonymous posters that their identities
are being sought, and give the defendants an opportunity to oppose
the request. The plaintiff must identify the exact statements
alleged to be unlawful.
"The court must then decide both whether the
complaint states a valid claim for relief, and whether the
plaintiff has enough evidence to support its claim."
If these three requirements are met, then the court concluded
that the ultimate decision as to whether the identity of the user
should be revealed depends upon striking a balance between
anonymous free speech rights and the strength of the arguments
supporting the demand for disclosure.
In the particular case before the court, the pharmaceutical
software and services supplier Dendrite International failed to
convince the court that it had fulfilled these requirements. The
court ruled that the company had not adequately shown that
allegedly false statements posted on a Yahoo! message board by
anonymous critics had caused the company harm.
In the UK, data protection regulations limit the circumstances
in which ISPs may be forced to disclose the identity of their
users. For more information on these regulations see our guide on
data protection .
