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The Wikimedia Foundation, and individual Wikimedians, have been involved in several lawsuits.

As defendants

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Defamation cases

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France

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In 2007, three French nationals sued the Wikimedia Foundation when an article on Wikipedia described them as gay activists.[1][2] A French court dismissed the defamation and privacy case, ruling that the Foundation was not legally responsible for information in Wikipedia articles.[2] The judge ruled that a 2004 French law limited the Foundation's liability, and found that the content had already been removed.[1][2] He found that the Foundation was not legally required to check the information on Wikipedia, and that "Web site hosts cannot be liable under civil law because of information stored on them if they do not in fact know of their illicit nature."[2] He did not rule whether the information was defamatory.[1][2]

Germany

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In January 2019, a court in Germany ruled against the Wikimedia Foundation, prompting it to remove part of the history and the allegedly defamatory content about a professor. The Wikipedia article's content was ruled defamatory because the link supporting its claims was no longer active, a phenomenon known as link rot.[3]

Romania

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Sorin Cerin sued the administrators of Romanian Wikipedia in Romanian courts, claiming "patent falsities".[4] The trial ended in 2021; the plaintiff lost the case.[5]

United Kingdom

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In May 2011, Louis Bacon, a hedge fund manager, obtained a court order in Great Britain, where he owned property, against the Wikimedia Foundation, the Denver Post and WordPress to compel them to reveal the identity of persons who he claimed had anonymously defamed him on Wikipedia and the other two websites. However, legal experts said that the order was probably unenforceable in the United States.[6][7] Initially, the Foundation agreed to give the information to Bacon's solicitors,[8] but later asserted that it would cooperate only with a court order in the U.S. It said, "we do not comply with foreign subpoenas absent an immediate threat to life or limb."[6]

Richard Desmond is the former owner of Asian Babes and Readers' Wives. In November 2021, The Guardian reported that he has hired lawyers to force Wikipedia to remove the word "pornographer" from his biographical page. Desmond has argued that he cannot factually be described as a pornographer because that term applies only to individuals who publish illegal and obscene material. Desmond says the top-shelf magazines and television channels he owned for decades were instead in the legitimate "adult material" category distributed in high-street shops and on Sky UK. Desmond has spent years having his Wikipedia page edited in a failed attempt to remove any suggestion that he is a "pornographer", preferring the term "philanthropist".[9]

United States

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In January 2008, Barbara Bauer, a literary agent, sued the Wikimedia Foundation in New Jersey Superior Court for defamation.[10][11][12] She claimed that a Wikipedia entry branded her the "dumbest" literary agent.[11] The case was dismissed because of the protections afforded by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.[12]

In December 2010, Sylvia Scott Gibson, author of Latawnya, the Naughty Horse, Learns to Say "No" to Drugs, sued Wikipedia in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. She took issue with how editors had described her book.[13] Her suit was dismissed on September 18, 2011, with Judge Otis D. Wright II writing, "Plaintiff demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the facts, the Internet, and the law."[14]

In 2013, Susan L. Burke filed a defamation lawsuit against two Wikipedia editors who edited under the handles Zujua and CapBasics359.[15] According to Zujua's attorneys, Zujua "edited a portion of Burke’s Wikipedia page concerning her lawsuit against Blackwater over the shooting deaths of Iraqi civilians. In editing this portion of her page, Zujua mistakenly linked her civil case against Blackwater with a federal criminal case against Blackwater employees over the same events. The latter case had been dismissed because of prosecutorial misconduct."[16] According to the ABA Journal, Burke "removed the false information" but CapBasics359 reverted her removal, at which point Burke sued.[17] On May 29, 2014, a Washington D.C. court quashed her subpoena to compel the Wikimedia Foundation to provide identifying information about Zujua, as a result of the application of D.C.'s recent anti-SLAPP laws. She was ordered to pay more than $400,000 in fees for bringing the suit.[a]

In 2014, Yank Barry filed a defamation lawsuit against four Wikipedia editors.[18][19] He withdrew it shortly thereafter.[20]

In 2023, John Anthony Castro filed a defamation lawsuit against a Wikipedia editor, alleging they had inserted libelous falsehoods into the article about him and seeking $180 million in damages. Castro subpoenaed the Wikimedia Foundation seeking identifying IP address information to assist him in serving the editor with the lawsuit. The United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas dismissed the lawsuit prior to enforcement of the subpoena and declared Castro a vexatious litigant, prohibiting him from filing further lawsuits in the district without leave of the court.

Privacy cases

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United Kingdom

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G & G vs. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. [2009] EWHC 3148 (QB) was an English legal case. The case involved "G" who sought a Norwich Pharmacal order requiring that the respondent disclose the IP address of an individual who had edited Wikipedia to include private and sensitive information about her and her child.[21] The order was granted.[22] The judgment drew attention, inter alia, in paragraph 12 to the risk that "the naming of the respondent may indirectly enable readers who already know other information about the case to identify of [sic] the claimant." The possibility is alluded to again in paragraph 40, which notes that "There are occasions when the court does impose a prohibition upon disclosure of the fact that an order has been made."[23]

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United States

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Main article: Texas Instruments signing key controversy

Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown notice to the Wikimedia Foundation because certain cryptographic keys were made public in an article on the Texas Instruments signing key controversy. A Wikipedia editor later filed a counter-notice. Because Texas Instruments did not reply in 10–14 business days as required by the DMCA, the keys were restored to the article.[citation needed]

In July 2010, the FBI sent a letter to the Wikimedia Foundation demanding that it cease and desist from using its seal on Wikipedia.[24] The FBI claimed that such practice was illegal and threatened to sue. In reply, Wikimedia counsel Michael Godwin sent a letter to the FBI claiming that Wikipedia was not in the wrong when it displayed the FBI seal on its website.[25] He defended Wikipedia's actions and also refused to remove the seal.[26]

As plaintiffs

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NSA lawsuit

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Main article: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

In March 2015, the Wikimedia Foundation, along with other groups, sued the National Security Agency over its upstream mass surveillance program.[27]

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. v. WordLogic Corporation et al

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Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. v. WordLogic Corporation et al was a lawsuit involving the Wikimedia Foundation as plaintiff and the companies WordLogic Corporation and 602531 British Columbia, Ltd. as defendants over a patent dispute.[28] WordLogic claims that the Wikimedia Foundation and the MediaWiki free software infringes on at least Claim 19 of the U.S. patent 7,681,124.[why?][29] Wikimedia denies those claims and has moved under 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201–2202 for a declaratory judgment against the WordLogic entities requesting a declaration from the Court that a number of patents property of defendants are invalid, and that Wikimedia Foundation does not infringe those patents "directly or indirectly, either literally or under the doctrine of equivalents" as provided by the Title 35 of the United States Code. The case was filed on March 11, 2020, before the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.[30] On July 18, 2020, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. moved to dismiss with prejudice its own complaint.[31]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ CapBasics359 was not served in the lawsuit and their identity was not revealed beyond information that they edited from a Starbucks location in California.

References

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  1. ^ a b c "Wikipedia cleared of defamation". The Inquirer. November 2, 2007. Archived from the original on October 24, 2014. Retrieved April 15, 2013.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  2. ^ a b c d e "Wikipedia cleared in French defamation case". Reuters. November 2, 2007. Archived from the original on December 21, 2012. Retrieved April 15, 2013.
  3. ^ Rogers, Jacob; Davenport, Allison (April 11, 2019). "A German court forced us to remove part of a Wikipedia article's 'history.' Here's what that means". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on April 14, 2019. Retrieved May 22, 2019.
  4. ^ "Wikipedia România, în mijlocul unui proces". Digi24 (in Romanian). September 15, 2016. Retrieved February 8, 2022.
  5. ^ "Detalii dosar 6954/2/2018". Înalta Curte de Casaţie şi Justiţie a României (in Romanian). Retrieved February 8, 2022.
  6. ^ a b "US billionaire wins high court order over Wikipedia 'defamation'". The Guardian. May 9, 2011. Archived from the original on December 2, 2016. Retrieved December 15, 2016.
  7. ^ "U.S. Law Protects Anonymous Speech, Not Billionaires". Forbes. May 10, 2011. Archived from the original on July 30, 2017. Retrieved September 4, 2017.
  8. ^ "Hedge fund boss wins Wikipedia case". Daily Telegraph. London, England. May 10, 2011.
  9. ^ Waterson, Jim (November 5, 2021). "Richard Desmond in legal battle with Wikipedia over term 'pornographer'". The Guardian. London, UK: Guardian News & Media. Archived from the original on August 11, 2022. Retrieved August 11, 2022.
  10. ^ "Wikipedia goes to court to defend defamation immunity". The Register. May 7, 2008. Archived from the original on August 1, 2013. Retrieved April 15, 2013.
  11. ^ a b Beaumont, Claudine (May 11, 2008). "Wikipedia fights defamation lawsuit". Telegraph. Archived from the original on November 9, 2012. Retrieved April 15, 2013.
  12. ^ a b "Bauer v. Wikimedia". Citizen Media Law Project. May 2, 2008. Archived from the original on July 13, 2010. Retrieved December 21, 2011.
  13. ^ "Gibson v Amazon complaint". Archived from the original on April 5, 2016. Retrieved September 9, 2017.
  14. ^ "ORDER by Judge Otis D Wright, II: Granting Defendants Pacific Lutheran University, Amazon for Sylvia Scott Gibson et al v. Amazon.com". Justia Dockets & Filings. Retrieved October 30, 2023.
  15. ^ "DC lawyer pursues suit to unmask authors who changed her Wikipedia page." ABA Journal. Sept. 16, 2013. Accessed July 6, 2023
  16. ^ "Burke v. Doe". cir-usa.org. Center for Individual Rights. Retrieved May 31, 2024.
  17. ^ Debra Cassens Weiss (September 16, 2013). "DC lawyer pursues suit to unmask authors who changed her Wikipedia page". ABA Journal. Retrieved September 16, 2013.
  18. ^ Simcoe, Luke (June 25, 2014). "Canadian businessman sues Wikipedia editors for defamation". Metronews.
  19. ^ Alfonso, Fernando III (June 24, 2014). "Wikipedia editors hit with $10 million defamation lawsuit". The Daily Dot. Retrieved May 14, 2019. Updated 11 December 2015.
  20. ^ "Philanthropist Yank Barry prepares to bolster lawsuit against Wikipedia editors, strategically withdraws first complaint". PRNews Channel. July 17, 2014. Retrieved August 2, 2014.
  21. ^ "G & G v Wikimedia Foundation Inc". 5RB. December 2, 2009. Retrieved July 16, 2016.
  22. ^ "Cases – G and G v Wikimedia Foundation Inc [2009] EWHC 3148 (QB)". One Brick Court. Archived from the original on September 12, 2017. Retrieved July 16, 2016.
  23. ^ G and G v Wikimedia Foundation Inc [2009] EWHC 3148 (QB)
  24. ^ "Letter from FBI to Wikimedia" (PDF). July 22, 2010. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 18, 2014. Retrieved August 16, 2012.
  25. ^ "Letter from Wikimedia to FBI" (PDF). July 30, 2010. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 18, 2014. Retrieved August 16, 2012.
  26. ^ Schwartz, John (August 2, 2010). "F.B.I., Challenging Use of Seal, Gets Back a Primer on the Law". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 6, 2014. Retrieved August 16, 2012.
  27. ^ Ingram, David (March 10, 2015). "NSA sued by Wikimedia, rights groups over mass surveillance". Reuters. Archived from the original on September 30, 2015. Retrieved August 28, 2015.
  28. ^ Masnick, Mike (April 2, 2020). "Predictive Text Patent Troll Tries To Shake Down Wikipedia". Techdirt. Retrieved April 7, 2020.
  29. ^ Ohanian, H. Artoush. "Re: Infringement of WordLogic Patents by Wikipedia Inc". DocumentCloud. Retrieved April 16, 2020.
  30. ^ "Complaint for declaratory judgment" (PDF). Wikimedia Commons. March 11, 2020. Retrieved March 19, 2020.
  31. ^ "Notice of Voluntary Dismissal" (PDF). CourtListener. Retrieved July 19, 2020.
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