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This Practice Note covers defamation in the context of social media. It examines how liability for defamation may arise for individuals, internet service providers (ISPs), website operators and employers and explores defences under the Defamation Act 1996 (DeA 1996), the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 (E-Commerce Regulations 2002), SI 2002/2013, the Defamation Act 2013 (DA 2013) and the Defamation (Operators of Websites) Regulations 2013 (DOW Regulations 2013), SI 2013/3028.

The internet and, in particular, social media is a high risk area for defamation litigation. Content posted on blogs, internet forums, online newspaper comment sections and well known social networking sites such as Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) can be inaccurate and vicious in character. Anonymity encourages some individuals to dispense with the usual restraints that they might apply to other forms of publication. For a description of the popular social media websites, how they are used by businesses and associated legal issues, see Practice Note: Introduction to social media.

Liability for defamatory content posted on social media is not, in principle, restricted to the author (who in any case may