French students’ group seeks $50M in criminal damages from Twitter - cochranhaustrand

A French Jewish student radical has filed a causa quest $50 million in criminal damages from Twitter and its CEO Dick Costolo over the company's failure to identify those responsible a series of racism posts last October. Twitter retorted that the union was "grandstanding."

The union filed suit connected Nov. 29 interrogative the Paris Ill-smelling Court to order Twitter to provide information allowing the identification of those trusty for posts contravening French laws on hate speech and carrying the hashtag #unbonjuif. It likewise asked that Twitter ply a smooth style for French users of the service to swag messages that would be illegal below those laws. Four other French antiracism organizations joined the lawsuit.

On Jan. 24 the royal court ordered Twitter to identify those involvedin the creation of the messages, which Twitter had blocked in answer to an earlier court society, and gave the company 15 years from receipt of the order in which to comply.

At the prison term, the union's lawyer told French media that the company would file a criminal complaint if the company did non disclose the identifying info within the time set by the court.

Background

Late Wednesday, the union told AFP that it had filed a criminal complaint against Twitter and Costolo for their failure to provide the information. IT has pledged to pass on to the Shoah Memorial the $50 jillio in damages it is seeking. By protecting the anonymity of the authors of the hate speech, Twitter has become their accomplice, union president Jonathan Hayoun told Alpha fetoprotein.

However, Twitter said Thursday it had only "received the order in the past few years" and that it planned to lodge an appeal against the January ruling on Friday.

"As yesterday's new filing shows, they are sadly more interested in grandstanding than taking the proper International legal track for this data," a Twitter representative said via electronic mail. "We are filing our appeal tomorrow, and would have filed it sooner if non for UEJF's wilful delay in processing the court's decision."

The companion did non elaborate along what role the UEJF could cause played in the delay of the January ruling.

The UEJF did non reply to a request for comment. On its website, information technology did non directly recognise the unaccustomed court filing, but republished an AFP news report citing its United States President on the topic.