U.S. District Judge William H. Orrick of San Francisco ruled that a legal action where Twitter was accused of offering material support to ISIS is groundless.
The lawsuit debuted in January, with the main accusation describing that the numerous ISIS-linked accounts on Twitter are a powerful material support for the terrorist group, and sought to hold the social network accountable for an ISIS-linked attack.
The action was started by the family of Lloyd Fields, a contractor who died in an ISIS-linked attack in Jordan. The suit asks Twitter for damages for Fields' life, arguing that ISIS manages an important part of its foreign recruitment policy via the social network.
According to the suit, Twitter violates the Anti-Terrorism Act by knowingly allowing ISIS to use its platform as a "tool for spreading extremist propaganda, raising funds and attracting new recruits."
The suit underlines that during last year alone, the organization convinced at least 30,000 foreign actors join its ranks through ISIS Twitter accounts.
The judge dismissed [PDF] the arguments of the plaintiffs, saying that their reasoning is faulty and their data does not make Twitter a culprit. The judge allowed the plaintiffs, in the next 20 days, to present an improved version of the complaint.
The verdict underlines that Twitter behaves like "a publisher of information provided by another information content provider."
Under the section 230(c), the confidential nature of Twitter's Direct Message is in accordance with the law.
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, or the Safe Harbor clause, is one of the cruxes of the matter in the lawsuit.
The clause was designed to guard online services from liability for speech published on their network. For example, a user who posts aggressive comment on the page of a newspaper can be held responsible, but the website (news organization) cannot be held accountable thanks to Section 230.
The situation with platforms such as Twitter and Facebook is precisely the same, as the social networks get immunity from all charges for what happens inside their networks.
The lawsuit against Twitter argued that the platform's continuous provision of material support for ISIS can be compared to a newspaper that chooses to publish a particular reporter.
The judge rejected that argument as well, ruling that "courts have repeatedly described publishing activity under section 230(c) as including decisions about what third-party content may be posted online." To support his decision, the judge cites the case Klayman versus Zuckerberg and Doe versus Myspace.
"As horrific as these deaths were ... Twitter cannot be treated as a publisher or speaker of ISIS's hateful rhetoric and is not liable under the facts alleged," says Judge Orrick.
Twitter has been in hot water over its incapacity to consistently locate and disrupt ISIS-linked accounts. The company repeatedly fought the criticism, pointing out that it did pull the plug on 26,000 ISIS accounts in March 2016 alone.
Meanwhile, Brookings Institute scholar Benjamin Wittes crafted a complex argument why Twitter should be held accountable both criminal and civil grounds. Only time will tell if his reasoning will find appeal with the courts.
