Responsibility for content published on the Internet: what are the rules?

Verified 03 December 2020 - Directorate for Legal and Administrative Information (Prime Minister)

If you are the victim of a malicious publication on the Internet (text, video, photo,...), you can report it and ask that it be removed. You can also file a complaint against the author of the publication and against the host of the site. The author of the publication will be punished if his publication violates the law (racism, insult, invasion of privacy...). The host will be punished if it is proven that he deliberately posted or left online this illegal content.

Relevant Content

Content posted on the internet can be sued by the French courts:

  • if it is available in France, in French,
  • or if intended for the French public,
  • or if it harms the interests of a person living in France.

This is even if the author is not in France and even if the site where the content is located is not a French site.

This can be a personal blog, a video or a social media post. A user comment can also be sued.

The content can be continued even if it is not accessible to all Internet users. It can, for example, be accessible to only certain "friends" on a social network.

Infringements concerned

The main infringements the offenses concerned are the following, when committed on the internet:

If you wish to have content removed from the Internet, you can use the procedure set up by the website host or use the legal procedure.

Site Host Specific Procedure

You can request the removal of content as part of a procedure specific to the host of that content.

Many hosts, such as video sites, set their own conditions for removing content, including due to copyright infringement or offensive images. For this purpose, they have specific signaling devices.

These withdrawal conditions may not correspond to the laws applicable in France and vary from one host to another.

Social networks also have their own conditions for content removal.

You can also request the removal of a comment according to rules specific to each site.

Procedure imposed on all hosts by law

This procedure depends on French law and not on the rules specific to each host. It differs depending on whether it is a post or a comment.

General case

You are a natural person

You must first talk to the author of the content.

If he refuses to withdraw it, you must contact his host. The contact details of the host must be indicated on the website in question.

The host does not have the obligation to constantly monitor all the content it stores. It must act only if it is told of specific content. A social network can be subject to the same rules as a host because it stores texts, images or videos.

To report content to a host in a legal context, you must follow a specific procedure.

Your application must include the following elements:

  • Your name, first name and e-mail address (this is not necessary if you are logged on to the site at the time of notification and your credentials are already registered)
  • Description of the disputed content, its precise location on the site and, if possible, the e-mail addresses that made it accessible
  • Legal grounds for removing the content (law apparently violated by the content)
  • Copy of 1era request for withdrawal addressed to the author or proof of impossibility to contact him (it is not necessary for infringements the most serious, such as terrorism, pedophilia and crimes against humanity)

You can make your request by registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt. You can ask a lawyer for help.

Who shall I contact

You can attach screenshots of the contents made by a commissioner of justice (former bailiff and judicial auctioneer).

If you report content knowingly knowing it is not illegal, you could face up to 1 year in prison and €15,000 of fine.

If you have used this procedure and the host does not promptly remove the content (by explicit refusal or by not responding to you), you can complain against him.

The complaint will be based on the fact that the offending content is contrary to the law (insults, racist, homophobic, sexist...).

FYI  

in cases of urgency and obvious harm, you can to request an application for interim measures to have content removed by the host. However, the latter will not be penalized.

You're a business

You must first talk to the author of the content.

If he refuses to withdraw it, you must contact his host. The contact details of the host must be indicated on the website in question.

The host does not have the obligation to constantly monitor all the content it stores. It must act only if it is told of specific content. A social network can be subject to the same rules as a host because it stores texts, images or videos.

To report content to a host in a legal context, you must follow a specific procedure

Your application must include the following elements:

  • Corporate form, name and email address (this is not necessary if the legal person's representative is logged in on the site at the time of notification and his/her identification is already registered)
  • Description of the disputed content, its precise location on the site and, if possible, the e-mail addresses that made it accessible
  • Legal grounds for removing content (law apparently violated by content...)
  • Copy of 1era request for withdrawal addressed to the author or proof of impossibility to contact him (this is not necessary for infringements the most serious, such as terrorism, pedophilia and crimes against humanity)

You can make your request by registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt. You can ask a lawyer for help.

Who shall I contact

You can attach screenshots of the contents made by a commissioner of justice (former bailiff and judicial auctioneer).

If you report content knowingly knowing it is not illegal, you could face up to 1 year in prison and €15,000 of fine.

If you have used this procedure and the host does not promptly remove the content (by explicit refusal or by not responding to you), you can complain against him.

The complaint will be based on the fact that the offending content is contrary to the law (insults, racist, homophobic, sexist...).

FYI  

in cases of urgency and obvious harm, you can to request an application for interim measures to have content removed by the host. However, the latter will not be penalized.

For a comment

You should contact the person responsible for the site where the comment is located.

You can use a registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt. You can ask a lawyer for help.

Who shall I contact

You can attach screenshots of the contents made by a commissioner of justice (former bailiff and judicial auctioneer).

Your request for withdrawal must be as precise as possible: offenses concerned, link to the comment in question, ...

If the site manager does not delete the comment quickly, you can complain against him for the offense in question.

FYI  

in cases of urgency and obvious harm, you can to request an application for interim measures to have a comment removed.

Complaint against the author of the illegal content

If you consider yourself a victim of content posted on the internet, you can complain against the author himself. He will be the one who will be accountable to the courts.

FYI  

the electronic complaint of psychological and sexual harassment of a discriminatory nature on the Internet must be lodged with the tribunal judiciaire de Paris, when the facts have been committed throughout the territory.

This author is the one who created the content in question: the editor of a blog, the director of a video, a photographer.

If you don't know his identity, you can file a complaint against X.

However, the host of the content is not responsible. The host is the one who ensures, for free or for a fee, the storage of any content (a blog, a video...) to make it available to the public via the Internet. It only provides technical means and it does not choose to post any content online. This is true even if the logo appears on the web page where the content is located (in the case of a video, for example).

However, the host must allow the court to identify the author(s) of the offending content.

To accompany your complaint, you can collect evidence yourself by any means, including screenshots. You can call on a commissioner of justice (former bailiff and judicial auctioneer) for this.

Many websites (news sites, blogs...) offer users the opportunity to comment on their content in a dedicated space located below the articles.

In the event of press offenses (insult, defamation, incitement to racial hatred...), the author of the comment is responsible for his remarks. Your complaint should therefore be directed at the author of the offending comment and not at the person responsible for the site where the comment is located.

Even if you are not a victim, you can report illegal content to the police and gendarmerie. This report is not a complaint.

Report illegal internet content (internet-reporting: Pharos)

Complaint against the host or the site manager

Répondez aux questions successives et les réponses s’afficheront automatiquement

Content

You can directly file a complaint against the website host if it refuses to remove the illegal content after your report.

Comment

You can directly file a complaint against the site manager only if you prove that he knew about the comment before it was posted. Some comment systems allow the site manager to validate each user's comment before it is published.

For other offenses such as death threats, your complaint may directly target the author of the comment and/or the site manager.

FYI  

the electronic complaint for psychological harassment and sexual harassment of a discriminatory nature must be brought before the tribunal judiciaire de Paris, when the acts were committed on the Internet throughout the territory.