High Court orders Facebook to disclose details of woman's abusers

Nicola Brookes left a message of support for an X Factor contestant on Facebook but some 'trolls' took exception and posted abusive messages about her. One troll set up a fake page in her name which was then used to send inappropriate messages to children.

The High Court has now ordered Facebook to disclose details of those users in order to help enable Brookes to identify them, according to reports by the BBC and the Guardian. The UK courts can issue what is called a Norwich Pharmacal Order to force the release of information.

Brookes told BBC Radio 4's Today Programme on Monday that she would use the information Facebook discloses to help unmask those responsible for the abuse.

"From that [disclosure] we can gain more evidence, gain the identities," she said. "We have a long way to go yet. But I'm not going to stop, I'm not going to give up until these people are found, exposed and held accountable for what they have done."

Brookes said that she had taken "hundreds" of screenshots of "graphic" and "vile" abuse to the police but was told that they could not investigate because the identity of the Facebook users could not be proven. She is intent on seeking prosecutions against some of those who can be identified, according to the Guardian's report.

Brookes labeled Facebook's complaint system "seriously flawed" and said that she did not block the messages she received because she would have not been able to gather evidence against the trolls if she had.

"These are a group of people that share information," she told the Today Programme. "They pick people out and target them on purpose. They invade your life, they steal your photos, they steal your identity and spread malicious, vicious things about you. If the system works in the first place I would never have had to go to the police."

Facebook said there is "no place for harassment" on its site, but said that "unfortunately a small minority of malicious individuals exist online, just as they do offline," according to the BBC's report. "We respect our legal obligations and work with law enforcement to ensure that such people are brought to justice," a spokesman for the company added.

There are strict controls over the disclosure of personal data under UK data protection laws. However, the Data Protection Act states that organisations are not held by these restrictions "where the disclosure is required by or under any enactment, by any rule of law or by the order of a court."

Under the Act the 'non-disclosure' of personal data rules are also "exempt" "where the disclosure is necessary for the purpose of, or in connection with, any legal proceedings (including prospective legal proceedings), or for the purpose of obtaining legal advice, or is otherwise necessary for the purposes of establishing, exercising or defending legal rights."

Information law expert Marc Dautlich, of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com said that "the difference with this order is that it has been made against a social media platform and not simply an ISP. The risk here is in terms of the richness of information that Facebook collects and in the future may be asked to reveal. It means that law enforcement agencies can now attempt to access all sorts of details about individuals to support enforcement measures."     

In a case ruled on by the Court of Appeal in December last year, three judges further considered whether requests for personal data disclosure should be granted on the basis of criteria established by a High Court judge who had previously ruled on the issue.

The Court of Appeal judges dismissed an appeal by ticket exchange website Viagogo that argued that the High Court had been wrong to order it to hand over identifying details of users. The Rugby Football Union (RFU) has claimed that some Viagogo users used the site to trade tickets for international matches at inflated prices.

The Court of Appeal ruled that there were "arguable wrongs" committed against the RFU and that the body was intending to seek redress for those wrongs. It determined that disclosure of individuals' information by Viagago was both necessary and proportionate in order to allow the RFU to pursue redress and also considered its own discretion to issue the disclosure order.