Newsletter
ISPS NOT LIABLE FOR USERS' ILLEGAL ACTS
Because current legislation in Taiwan does not define whether Internet service providers (ISPs) bear liability for unlawful actions committed by Internet users, this is a controversial issue. In a 2005 judgment about defamation in an Internet chat room, the Taipei District Court held that the service provider did not bear liability for its user''s illegal actions.
In the reasons for its judgment, the court indi-cated that although an ISP may unilaterally es-tablish management guidelines when providing an online platform for the exchange of views, such guidelines are for the convenience of management, and their existence cannot be used to make the provider of such platform liable to pay compensation for the actions of others. Moreover, the management structures and regu-latory capability of an ISP are markedly different from those of the printing press or electronic media in general, mainly in that the printed or electronic media have the power to review, alter, or reject advertising material before it is printed or broadcast, so that if they decide to publish or broadcast such material, it cannot avoid respon-sibility for any resulting infringement of others'' rights. However, ISPs lack mechanisms for prior review of content published by the users of their services, and in practice they do not have the technological ability to do effective prior screening. If ISPs were to be held jointly liable for all actions of service users, this would place too heavy a burden of liability on them, and would have an impact on the development of the Internet. The result would be a contraction in Internet service, thus harming the interests of consumers.