Social Media and the Criminal Law

The emergence of social media has opened new
channels of mass communication and expression. It is
possible to reach an unlimited audience with the click
of a mouse or the use of a smartphone. However, due
to the anonymity that social media affords, it has
opened new avenues for perpetrators to threaten,
intimidate and incite. Social Media and the Criminal
Law makes a cross-jurisdictional assessment as to
whether the existing law is adequate for dealing with
criminal conduct committed on social media sites in a
manner that is compatible with human rights
legislation and case law. After defining the social media
landscape, it describes and analyses how social media
expression is translated into criminal litigation. Since
there is no “social media law”, the book especially
assesses how in selected Common and Civil law
jurisdictions laws traditionally governing particular
types of expressive activity have converged in relation
to criminal activity such as threats, hate speech,
harassment, bullying, defamation, indecent images of
children and terrorism.
This book’s main focus is social media expression that
plans and incites crimes, civil unrest and violent public
protest and how this expression receives constitutional
or human rights protection. Do human rights
instruments protect people’s messages, tweets, and
Facebook posts that encourage an audience to protest?
Can social media activity expose the average person to
criminal liability when these protests turn violent? In an
age where existing law can be seamlessly applied to
new technologies and means of interaction, this book’s
comparative law approach to criminal activity on social
media provides a much-needed analysis.