The Responsible Web: How Tort Law Can Save the Internet

Abstract

This article argues that cyberbullying and online abuse constitute a privacy problem previously unseen. Factors such as the frequency of unlawful conduct, the dynamics of online communication and the impotence of criminal law when dealing with digital privacy violations paint a dark picture: criminal law, the go-to justice system in cases of bullying and abuse, fails to provide adequate protection of privacy rights in digital contexts. There is, however, an alternative. The law of civil liability (tort law/the law of delict) delivers where criminal law fails. Civil liability law provides the victim of cyberbullying or online abuse with a powerful instrument with which she can seek justice on her own. Conscious efforts to use civil liability to combat bullying and abuse can, the author argues, strengthen the protection of digital privacy.