Member wants posts/account deleted
 

Anyone know what the law is regarding requests for accounts to be deleted? (UK law)

I have a member who wants his account deleted (and all his posts) as he feels they are deflamatory and maligning to himself (even though he posted them).

Ban him and his ip. Don't talk to him or reply to his emails.

he is threatening court action if ignore his request

Personally, I'd tell him to pound sand. He said it. If he can't live with it, that's his problem.

And it's defamatory. No 'L'.

Personally I feel exactly the same BUT if the law is on his side then I don't have much option.

I would also be willing to call his bluff on the 'court order' but again if I have to pay his expenses on obtaining the court order than I'd sooner not.

I'm guessing someone must be in a similar situation (now or previously)?

The last thing you want is by some fluke this ends up in court, but deleting posts causes trouble too. If it was me...I would use the mod that switches a thread owner. Then switch his/her posts and delete the user and ban his/her ip.

What law does he reckon he's going to get this "court order" under?

I can think of no law that would force you to remove his posts/account.

I have no idea...lol.
He has confirmed that it's just his own accounts and posts that he wishes to be deleted.

The story behind this I think is that he was 16 / 17 year old who posted up his experiances (within our forum subject), his posts were often very obvious as BS and other members would happily question and point out the guys flaws in his 'stories' and this would obviously high light the fact that the guy was lying and a bit of a joke.

I think he's now a few years older and wants this history gone.

You have a copyright notice on your site right?
If yes, then the content of your site is yours.
If no, then add a copyright notice. He may have a point.

Definitely have a copyright! Tell him to simply log out and never come back.
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VAPORIZER AFFILIATE PROGRAM

what do you guys add as your copyright notice and where do you put it?

thanks

Copyright notice is in vboptions and takes a statement. If you have a terms of service statement, it probably explicitly states that posts are the property of the forum and covered under the forum copyright not the poster. Usually the terms of service agreement is full of weasel words that avoid (and cover situations exactly like this one) any culpability by the forum owner. But you are forgetting something, I think. Your forum has been indexed by many search engines and spiders and content scrapers. Just because you delete it from your server (I would not btw) that doesn't mean it gone so he's pretty much screwed on that account and you have no control over that piece of the pie. Unless you get something from a verifiable legal entity, you don't have to do anything but ban this morons and his IP address and do not under any circumstances correspond with him in any forum. In this case blackhole is best.

HTH

I don't think you copyright peoples posts on a message board.

Once they're posted they're posted.

Just ignore them. Don't even respond to them at all.