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The Supreme Court issued a verdict Thursday opening up Web sites to liability for damages to an individual’s reputation. The verdict states that a portal site that has engaged in “actions similar to editing.” In other words, when it does not block a personally injurious Internet posting, the media outlet can be charged for criminal libel for acts relating to defamation on the Web, and it must delete slanderous posts or block searches of the offending posts, even if not requested to do so by the victim.

In a suit requesting damages from major South Korean portal sites, filed in 2005 by an individual identified by the surname “Kim” who claimed to have “suffered damages because of false information spreading on the Internet,” Supreme Court head justice Kim Young-ran presented an en banc ruling confirming the original judgment that Naver, Daum Communications, SK Communications and Yahoo!Korea were responsible for compensation in the amounts of 10 million won, 7 million won, 8 million won and 5 million won, respectively.

“If a portal site actively chooses part of an article transmitted by a media outlet and positions it in specific areas, and that article contains material damaging to another individual’s reputation, the portal site is responsible for damages as a ‘co-perpetrator’ along with the media outlets that report the article in question,” the court stated.

The court also ruled, “If a writing is posted that damages another’s reputation, and the portal site can recognize possible damage, it is obligated to either delete the writing in question or to block similar writings from being posted, even if there is no request for deletion from the victim.”

Some are reacting to this verdict with concerns that portal sites might infringe on the rights of users in order to avoid future liability in libel cases. “With this verdict, people are worried that the Korea Communications Commission is going to lead portal site operators to engage in irresponsible acts like monitoring and deleting user posts simply out of a desire to preclude any potential liability,” said Kim Seong-gon, policy office director of the Korea Internet Corporations Association.

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