The latest defamation case about Google's search
engine results has just come out. It's a warning to search
engines and online publishers generally, and a nod to defamation
litigants everywhere to pursue them.
It all started when Dr Janice Duffy, a medical researcher,
consulted some online psychics about her love life. After the
psychics' predictions didn't eventuate (shock!) Dr Duffy
posted negative reviews about the psychics on a website called the
Ripoff Report (who'd have thought psychics might be a
rip-off?). The psychics responded with posts labelling Duffy a
"psychic stalker". Because of this, a Google search of
her name started returning results with extracts of the articles
calling her a psychic stalker, and its autocomplete function
offered the words psychic stalker after her name. Dr Duffy asked
Google to remove all that. Google refused. Litigation ensued.
