The Virginia Supreme Court this week ruled that a judge didn t have the right to force Yelp to release the real names of people who had written negative reviews about a Virginia carpet-cleaning service, according to The Hill.
The court sidestepped the question of how to handle First Amendment protections for anonymous speech when a company claims it has been defamed.
Instead, it said that the business, Hadeed Carpet Cleaning, needed to take its complaint to California where Yelp and its data are based.
The lawyer for Hadeed said the business hadn t decided whether it would try again in the Golden State, The Washington Post reported. The company may appeal to the Virginia General Assembly for help pursuing cases with companies based out of the state. The decision is a blow to businesses with issues with Yelp, he said.
In 2012, Hadeed sued seven Yelp reviewers in Virginia for defamation and sought their identities from Yelp, which refused. A lower court judge had ordered Yelp to turn over the information, and an appellate court backed that decision. Yelp challenged the ruling.
The case has been seen as a test of the limits of anonymous speech on the Web. Yelp argued in court that Hadeed needed to prove that the reviews were false, a standard set in other states, before requiring Yelp to name the reviewers.
Supporters of Yelp s anonymity policy declared the Virginia decision a victory, although the court was narrowly focused on the procedural issue of jurisdiction.
Paul Alan Levy, a Public Citizen lawyer representing Yelp, said in a statement:
If Hadeed turns to California courts to learn the identities of its critics, those courts will require it to show evidence to meet the well-accepted First Amendment test for identifying anonymous speakers.
Above: Yelp s logo.