New York Business Litigation Lawyer Blog
In an interesting case from the California Supreme Court, the court decided, in a 102 page split 4-3 decision, that an order compelling a writer to remove a post on Yelp cannot be used to compel Yelp to remove that post when the poster defaults or fails to do so.
The details of this case and its legal background are a bit beyond the scope of this post (and we did not fully review the 102-page decision), but we try to provide an overview of the facts and circumstances of this case.
Yelp and others like it are generally immune from lawsuits for third-party reviews and statements under the Decency Comminations Act (the “DCA”). Under the DCA, so long that Yelp simply acts as a passive bulletin board it is not seen as offending the rights of another, including with posts that are claimed to be defamatory. In this case, Ava Bird, a client of a law firm, allegedly posted negative reviews about the firm which it claimed were defamatory. Bird defaulted in the law firm’s suit against her, and the lower court granted the firm the main relief it sought ordering Bird to remove the posts. Included in the court’s decision was a directive to Yelp that if Bird did not remove the posts Yelp must. In issuing that order, the court recognized the limitations of the DCA but held that because Yelp was not found culpable or liable for any wrongdoing, his decision did not run afoul of the DCA. All the court required was that Yelp remove the posts if Bird did not, but nothing more. Yelp challenged the decision and sought its vacatur. Yelp argued that it was not a party to the lawsuit yet was required to do something, thus deprived of its due process in the lawsuit, and also claimed that the DCA shielded it from having to do anything. The court rejected Yelp’s arguments and stuck to its original decision. The appellate court affirmed, ruling that Yelp was not a publisher of these posts, had no right to be heard, and was not protected, in this setting, by the DCA. Yelp appealed to the California Supreme Court, where more than a dozen amicus briefs were filed in support of Yelp.
The California Supreme Court, in the narrowest of decisions where even the fourth vote in Yelp’s favor questioned the reach of the DCA and shared some of the sentiments of the two dissenting opinions, found in favor of Yelp and reversed. The reversal was based on the court’s decision that the DCA protected Yelp from any responsibility to do anything—party to the litigation or not—because to do so would allow a plaintiff to circumvent Yelp’s immunity under the DCA. The immunity provided to Yelp by the DCA was absolute even if the relief sought was not directly from Yelp.