Google lands crucial win in defamation battle

Google has scored a major victory in Australia’s highest court, with huge implications for the global search engine.

Google cannot be held responsible for defamatory articles accessed via its search results, Australia’s highest court ruled on Wednesday.

The landmark judgment related to claims by Melbourne criminal lawyer George Defteros, who was seeking damages from the US tech giant over an article published by The Age in 2004.

A panel of High Court justices overturned a previous ruling by the Victorian Supreme court ordering Google to pay Mr Defteros $40,000 for linking to the article in its search results.

The article detailed the arrest of Mr Defteros on charges of conspiring to kill underworld figure Carl Williams, which were subsequently dropped.

Australia’s highest court ruled Google is not liable as a ‘publisher’ of its search results. Picture: NCA Newswire / Gaye Gerard

Victoria’s Supreme Court had found Google to be liable as a “publisher” of the article despite having no participation in its creation.

On appeal, a ruling by the High Court found it could not be concluded that Google published the article.

“The provision of the Search Result, including the hyperlink, has no connection to the creation of the … article,” the ruling by Chief Justice Susan Kiefel and Justice Jacqueline Gleeson stated.

“Its creation was in no way approved or encouraged by the appellant [Google]; and the appellant did not participate in it being placed on The Age’s website.”

In a separate judgment, Justice Stephen Gageler noted that while Google could not be considered a publisher for regular search results, in the case of sponsored results the company’s liability may be different.

He found for sponsored results there may be a degree of “enticement or encouragement to click on the hyperlink”.

George Defteros was seeking damages from Google for linking to an article about him in its search results. Picture: Stuart McEvoy / The Australian

In a submission to the High Court ahead of the decision, Google warned if it upheld the ruling, the company may be forced to “censor” search results which receive complaints.

“The inevitable consequence of leaving the court of appeal’s decision undisturbed is that Google will be required to act as censor by excluding any webpage about which a complaint is made from its search results,” the company’s lawyers said.

“Even when, as here, the webpage may be a matter of legitimate interest to the substantial portion of people who search for it and is published by a reputable news source.”