An Australian judge has ruled Google, owner of YouTube, liable for harm caused to John Barilaro from December 2020 (AFP/Archives/Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV)
An Australian federal court on Monday ordered Google to pay more than 466,000 euros to an Australian politician who had been defamed in videos of a comedian hosted on YouTube.
In 2020, John Barilaro was Deputy Premier of New South Wales when he was targeted by an Australian comedian, known as ‘friendlyjordies’. In videos posted on YouTube, he accused her of corruption by imitating her Italian accent.
In court, this former senior politician collapsed while watching one of them, shot by the comedian in a luxurious house that the elected official owned and rented on AirBnB.
“I’m traumatized by all of this,” Barilaro said as he gave his testimony in court.
At the end of 2021, he had reached an agreement with “friendlyjordies”, whose real name is Jordan Shanks. The comedian has thus presented his apologies and agreed to modify the videos, which have been viewed more than a million times on YouTube.
Judge Steven Rares ruled that Google, owner of YouTube, was liable for the harm caused to Mr Barilaro from December 2020, when the politician’s lawyers wrote to the American giant asking it to remove the videos offensive. The magistrate ordered Google to pay damages.
According to him, these videos caused Mr. Barilaro to leave public office prematurely — he resigned from parliament in October 2020 — “and traumatized him considerably”.
Mr Rares also felt that Mr Shanks “needed YouTube to spread his poison” and that Google was ready to join the comedian “to earn revenue as part of its business model”.
Google has been contacted by AFP to respond to a request for comment.
© 2022 AFP
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