Internet Defamation Lawyer Florida

Defamation under Florida law requires: (1) a false statement of fact presented as true, (2) published to third parties, (3) that identifies or makes you identifiable, (4) causing harm to your reputation, and (5) made with the required level of fault — negligence for private figures, actual malice for public figures.

Key point: opinions are protected. “I think this restaurant has bad service” is opinion. “This restaurant failed a health inspection for rodents” is a statement of fact — and defamatory if false. The statement must be presented as fact, not opinion.

You can request removal by reporting the content to the platform (Google, Facebook, Yelp, etc.), sending a cease and desist letter to the poster, or filing a defamation lawsuit that includes injunctive relief compelling removal. Legal demands from an attorney carry significantly more weight than user reports alone.

We send formal legal demand letters to platforms and posters simultaneously. Many platforms remove content within 24-72 hours when presented with documented defamation claims.

Yes. You file suit against “John Doe” and then use pre-suit discovery or court-ordered subpoenas to compel the platform or ISP to reveal the poster’s identity. Courts have consistently held that anonymity does not provide immunity from defamation liability — the First Amendment protects anonymous speech, but not false statements of fact that harm others.

Act quickly. ISPs typically retain IP address logs for 90 days or less. Delay can mean that identifying information is permanently gone.

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act generally immunizes platforms (Google, Facebook, Yelp, etc.) from liability for content posted by third-party users. This means you typically cannot sue the platform itself for hosting the defamatory post — your claim is against the poster who wrote it.

Section 230 does not protect the person who actually wrote and published the defamatory content. It also does not prevent courts from ordering platforms to remove content pursuant to a valid court order.

In a Florida defamation case you may recover: compensatory damages for harm to your reputation, emotional distress, and economic losses (lost clients, lost income, medical expenses); special damages for specific financial losses you can document; presumed damages in defamation per se cases, which do not require proof of actual harm; and punitive damages where the defendant acted with actual malice.

In some cases, courts also award attorney fees where the defamatory content was particularly egregious or published with malice.

Florida’s statute of limitations for defamation is two years from the date the defamatory statement was published (Section 95.11(4)(g), Fla. Stat.). The clock typically starts when the content first went live — not when you discovered it. Do not wait. If you are past two years from publication, you may still have other viable claims. Contact us to evaluate your specific situation.

It depends on the content. A review expressing dissatisfaction with service (“Waited 45 minutes, food was cold”) is opinion and not actionable. A review stating specific false facts (“This restaurant was cited by the health department for cockroaches in the kitchen”) can be defamatory if the claims are false and presented as fact.

We evaluate reviews case by case. The key questions are: is the statement verifiable as true or false? Is it presented as fact? Did it cause you quantifiable harm? If yes to all three, you likely have a claim.

Potentially, yes. Each republication of a defamatory statement can constitute a separate act of defamation. Under Florida’s “single publication rule,” online content is generally treated as published once — when it first goes live — rather than each time someone views it. However, deliberate reposting or sharing to a new audience can constitute a new publication.

We analyze the chain of publication in each case to identify all potentially liable parties.

Take these steps immediately: (1) Screenshot everything — the post, the URL, the date, and any replies. Do not rely on the platform to preserve it. (2) Do not contact or confront the poster directly — this can complicate your legal case. (3) Do not post a public response — this can appear to legitimize the content. (4) Contact an attorney. The sooner we get involved, the faster we can act to limit damage and preserve evidence.