A new ruling opens legal liability for Facebook comments. Here's how to moderate your page

A recent high-court ruling has set a new precedent for defamation within social media comment sections and comments on websites, with potential ramifications for small businesses active online.

With the 5-2 ruling in favour of Dylan Voller, the judge determined that if you post content on your social media page and encourage or invite comments, you’re legally the ‘publisher’ of those comments — and can therefore be sued for defamation.

For small businesses who may already be struggling to find enough resources to run their social media pages, it’s a potential timebomb.

While the ruling was specifically against a media company — making it easier to deem them a ‘publisher’ on Facebook — the same logic could hypothetically be applied to any small business active on social media.

Until there is a test case brought to the courts, it’s unclear what your legal exposure may be.

As Marque Lawyers managing partner Michael Bradley tells SmartCompany Plus, “Anyone that is administering a Facebook page would be wise to consider risk mitigation at this point. You don’t want to be the next case if you can avoid it.”

Professor David Walsh of Sydney University adds, “Defamation law applies to all forms of communication, it’s not just for the media. Private businesses, and individuals are subject to our defamation laws.”

The simplest fix is to lock down the comments on your social media posts — but that also means forgoing the reach and engagement that comes with people interacting with your page.

Ultimately, it’s a matter of balancing risk versus reward. However, you can be proactive in filtering some abusive words, and people.

Here are a few simple ways to moderate your Facebook comments.

Profanity filters

Facebook has profanity filters, which will hide what Facebook calls “the most commonly reported words and phrases marked as offensive by the community”.

While the comments won’t be seen by the general public visiting your page, they will still be seen by the people who wrote them, and their Facebook friends.

It’s a smart idea to turn these on, as the filters will pick up the offensive language before you’ve even had a chance to see the comment.

How to turn on profanity filters

Log in to Facebook, click the down arrow in the top right corner, then click ‘Switch profile’.
Select your business page.
Click your page’s photo icon in the top right, and then select the ‘Settings and privacy’ tab.
Click ‘Settings’, then click ‘Privacy’.
In the left menu, click ‘Public posts’.
In the ‘Moderation’ section, go to ‘Profanity filter’, then click ‘Edit’.
Click the switch button to turn the profanity filter on or off. When it’s on, the button will be blue.
Click save.

Filtering out specific words

Facebook has an option to cut out specific words not covered under its profanity filter.

You can choose up to 1,000 keywords, phrases, or emojis to block from your page, which will automatically hide variations of them too.

Facebook’s admin guide to moderation explains, “If you block the word ‘tree’, we’ll automatically block variations of that word, such as: TREE, t.r.e.e., tr33, treee and #tree.”

How to filter out words

From your news feed (the Facebook home page) click ‘Pages’ in the left menu.
Go to your business page, then click ‘Settings’ in the left menu.
From ‘General’, click ‘Page moderation’.
Add keywords that you want to block:
- To add words or phrases: Type the words or phrases separated by commas, then click add;
- To add an emoji: Click the smiley logo, then select the emoji that you want to block, then click add; and
- To add a list of keywords: Click upload from .CSV, then follow the instructions to upload your file.
Click ‘Save’.

Limiting who can comment

To avoid having to monitor and moderate your Facebook comments on a daily basis, you can limit who can comment in the first place. It’s generally the safest option, and the least effort from the owner of the page.

The drawback is that comments bring more attention to your post, as your post is then more likely to appear in the news feed of people who follow the commenter.

If you think a post is likely to invite heated debate, or is on a controversial topic, it might be worth disabling or limiting the comments on the post.

How to limit who can comment on your posts

Go to the post on your page that you’d like to change who can comment on it.
Click the three small dots in the top right of the post.
Click ‘Who can comment on your post?’ from the drop down menu.
Select who is allowed to comment on your public post, either:
- Public (anyone can comment);
- Pages you follow (any page on Facebook in your business’ ‘follow’ list); or
- Profiles and Pages you mention (only pages that you’ve specifically tagged in the post).
If a profile or page who wants to comment on your post isn’t in your selected comment audience:
- They won’t see the ‘Comment’ button below the post; and
- They’ll see that you’ve limited who can comment on your post.

How to respond to claims of defamation

While the recent high court case opens up new potential liabilities for businesses on social media, recent changes to defamation laws across NSW, SA, Victoria, and the ACT, prevent you from being taken to court without the plaintiff first sending a concerns notice that documents how they believe they’ve been defamed, and the damage to their reputation.

Additionally, the onus is now on plaintiffs to demonstrate serious harm, whereas previously defendants had to prove that defamatory statements were not likely to do so.

“You now have to prove an additional element: that you suffered serious harm to your reputation, and if you’re a corporation and allowed to sue for defamation, you have to prove serious financial loss. It has to be serious harm to reputation, and serious financial loss,” says Professor David Walsh.

So what does this all mean for SMEs?

If you get a legal letter in which a person is claiming they’ve been defamed on your social media platform, a quick retraction and apology is likely to solve the issue.

As Walsh puts it, “If you get a notice, and someone says something that you’re hosting is defamatory and you take it down, that’s the best way of managing the risk.

“While there might be some harm done to reputation while it’s up, there would be less [than the alternative].

“Full and prompt apology and retraction means that the element of serious harm may not be satisfied.”