Facebook and Twitter were ordered to appear in court after two teenage youths were identified on their platforms as the murderers of Ana Kriegel — despite a court order that they not be named.
As Eoin Reynolds and Laura Slattery report:
The order was made after it emerged that social media users had identified the 14-year-old boys despite an order by the trial judge preventing their being named and a provision under the Children Act that prohibits the identification of minors accused of or convicted of a criminal offence.
Read more on Irish Times.
Remember when other convicted murderers demanded that U.S. sites remove their names because they had been issued an order by a court protecting their identities? And remember how some of us said that we were not bound by what a court in Germany might decide and our First Amendment and press freedoms trumped (no pun intended) a non-U.S. court?
Well, that was a few years ago, and now it seems that platforms are making serious efforts to comply with non-U.S. laws — even if they directly conflict with our notion of a free press.
Hmmmm.