I will talk approximately the upward push of cyber-defamation. The number of cyber-associated tort instances filed within the Kuala Lumpur High Court in 2018 improved to 60 over from over 50 cases. Most of these cases had been related to cyber-defamation.
The Court treated numerous defamatory online postings that went viral. In those cases, the High Court has granted damages among RM50,000 to RM100,000.
The High Court become tasked to evaluate the damages to be granted to the Plaintiff towards the Defendant for publishing defamatory statements in an email to at the least four recipients.
It turned into no longer disputed that the stated email has been circulated the various public via the internet to as many human beings as feasible and the Defendant invited the recipients to study and spread its contents as widely as possible.
The Court held that the stated electronic mail became no longer an everyday e-mail directed to at least one character, but the stated electronic mail changed into written in the context to cope with the general public, to have the stated electronic mail broadly circulated some of the public. Therefore, the Court becomes of the view that the said electronic mail was extensively circulated and/or presumed to be so.
The Defendant’s try and show that the email become sent only to the 4 people named therein or 5 people as an entire as pondered with the aid of the Plaintiffs does no longer change the scenario or fact that such guide inside the net via electronic mail is deemed to be wide flow due to the fact the Defendant supposed the wide circulation of the said e-mail based on her statements within the stated e-mail wherein the Defendant requested the public to circulate the stated e-mail.
The Court held that it’s miles nearly impossible to show exactly to whom the said email had been circulated, there is a presumption by way of law that such circulation over the net is presumed to be a huge booklet and the onus is on the Defendant to show the constrained ebook as alleged.
The Plaintiff is the government director of ‘Lawyers for Liberty’, a human rights lawyers’ non-governmental business enterprise, and a famous human rights attorney and activist in Malaysia.
The Defendant is a member of the Pertubuhan Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma), a non-governmental business enterprise set up in 1997. Isma’s most important attention is Islamic propagation in the united states of America.
The High Court found that the Plaintiff had didn’t show that the impugned statement became defamatory as he had didn’t show that his reputation has been adversely affected and tainted. The High Court also disregarded the Defendant’s defense of justification and fair remark.
On attraction, the Court of Appeal determined that the impugned assertion is derogatory, calculated to incite hatred and anger amongst the multi-spiritual groups and ethnicity in Malaysia.
The impugned announcement no longer handiest described the Plaintiff as a fraudster, a liar who incites hatred of the Islamic faith, but additionally as someone funded and supported by means of overseas entities, which includes the US of America and the European Union.
In their herbal and regular that means, impugned declaration intended and turned into understood to intend through reasonable and regular readers of the item that the Plaintiff is anti–Islam. Therefore, taking the bane and the antidote of the item posted the defamatory assertion had handiest one cause, this is, to tarnish the plaintiff’s individual and reputation.
