Krinsky v. Doe 6

Krinsky v. Doe 6
Court	California Courts of Appeal
Decided	Feb 6, 2008
Citation(s)	159 Cal.App.4th 1154
Case history
Prior action(s)	Santa Clara Superior Court denied Doe 6's motion to quash the subpoena for his identity.
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Franklin D. Elia, Conrad L. Rushing and Eugene M. Premo
Case opinions
Applying the prima facie standard, the Court held that Doe 6's anonymous speech was protected under the First Amendment and upheld Doe 6's motion to quash the disclosure of his identity.
Keywords
Defamation, Anonymous speech, Internet speech

Krinsky v. Doe 6, was a decision by the California Court of Appeal, Sixth District, addressing the evidentiary standard required of plaintiffs seeking the identification of anonymous Internet posters. The case addressed defamation and the right to anonymous speech on the Internet.^[1][2] Plaintiff Lisa Krinsky sued Doe 6, an anonymous poster to Yahoo! message boards, for defamation. Krinsky served a subpoena to Yahoo! for Doe 6's identity. Doe 6 filed a motion to quash the subpoena, "contending that he had a First Amendment right to speak anonymously on the Internet."

While the court declined to adopt more stringent unmasking standards used by other courts, the Appellate Court nonetheless held that the language of Doe 6's posts were not actionable defamatory statements because they did not assert objective facts about the plaintiff. Rather, it held that Doe 6's posts "fall into the category of crude, satirical hyperbole which, while reflecting the immaturity of the speaker, constitute protected opinion under the First Amendment."^[3]