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Franco Caraccioli is a third-year law student in San Diego. For reasons not explained in the opinion, someone created a fake Facebook account named “Franco Caracciolijerkingman” and posted photos and videos of Caraccioli “sexually arousing or pleasuring himself.” (All facts are based on allegations in Caraccioli’s complaint). The court doesn’t explain how the third party obtained those photos or videos. The operator of the fake Franco Caracciolijerkingman account then sent friend requests to a large number of Caraccioli’s friends, effectively disseminating the photos and videos to Caraccioli’s personal and professional contacts. Caraccioli complained about the fake account to Facebook, which allegedly initially rebuffed his takedown request because it “determined that Franco Caracciolijerkingman is a person who’s using Facebook in a way that follows the Facebook Community Standards.” After more complaints, Facebook allegedly changed its mind and took down the fake account. Caraccioli then sued Facebook for numerous causes of action.

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Case citation: Caraccioli v. Facebook, Inc., 2016 WL 859863 (N.D. Cal. March 7, 2016). The complaint. Techdirt’s initial coverage.

The content in this post was found at http://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2016/03/facebook-isnt-liable-for-fake-user-account-containing-non-consensual-pornography-caraccioli-v-facebook-forbes-cross-post.html and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.