Selling Net Advertising, Inc. sued for disclosure of personal information, claims no redirects and judicial decision
Does it say don’t redirect?
Did Selling Net Advertising Inc. (now “Selling Net Advertising Group Co., Ltd.”), a TSE Growth-listed company, “expose” or “not expose” the personal information of Mr. A, one of the operators of the media outlet “Suan,” who had criticized the company?
Selling Inc. claims that it deleted the description of Mr. A on its website in accordance with the court’s “deletion order. However, Mr. A’s side judged this to be “a breach of the obligation to delete. Based on the decision of indirect compulsion, they filed a petition with the court for an order of attachment of claims, demanding payment of a total of over 17 million yen, including a penalty of 100,000 yen per day.
For more details, please read the first part of the article, “‘Aiming to Discourage Speech Activities’…TSE Growth-listed Company ‘Selling Company’ and Web Media in a Swampy Legal Battle”.
In the second part, we will introduce the arguments of both sides regarding “redirection.
There are two main points of contention that Selling Inc. is making in court.
Here is the first argument.
The representative director (editor’s note: Mr. Leo Koichi Kato) gave the redirection instructions to the executive officer (editor’s note: actual name omitted) of Selling.net Advertising Co. Ltd. is the subject of the redirect, not the plaintiff.
(from the brief of the “Selling Company” side) The parent company (“Selling Net Advertising Group Co., Ltd.”) received the provisional injunction order, but since the redirection was done by a subsidiary company (“Selling Net Advertising Co., Ltd.”), which is a separate legal entity, they claim that they are not responsible.
The second argument is as follows.
Even if the plaintiffs did redirect, this does not violate this decision (editor’s note: provisional disposition decision). (Editor’s Note: The provisional injunction decision. The statement in the title of obligation regarding this case (referring to the provisional disposition decision), “1. The obligor shall provisionally delete the portion of the posted articles listed in the attached List of Posted Articles No. 1 and the portion of the posted articles listed in the attached List of Posted Articles No. 2 and surrounded by the red line in Exhibit 1, and the portion surrounded by the orange line in Exhibit 1,” is uniform and uniform in content, and the deletion of the posted articles is not a violation of this decision (editor’s note: referring to the provisional disposition decision). There is no mention of re-posting or redirection after the deletion.
The court’s order only states, “Delete specific descriptions,” and does not say, “Do not redirect. Therefore, there is no violation of the order.
It contradicts his past words and actions.
Mr. A’s side refutes this claim by saying, “This is a formalism and sophistry to escape responsibility.
First, to the claim that “another company did it,” Mr. A’s side refutes, “That claim is inconsistent with what you have said and done in the past.
In the case of a maintenance objection (editor’s note: objection to the provisional disposition) (omitted) to the provisional disposition decision in this case, the plaintiff (editor’s note: “Selling Company”) itself submitted a petition to change the company name on January 31, ’25. (Omitted) This fact is nothing but the plaintiff’s self-admission that it has succeeded to the rights and obligations of the former company name (the noncomplaining company) and is the debtor itself in this provisional disposition decision.
If he was not the administrator of the website itself, he should have filed a motion to that effect with the court at this point. Failing to do so and claiming a “separate company” now is a breach of faith and bad faith, and is not a reason for this enforcement action to be exempted on the grounds of default by a third party (editor’s note: a subsidiary).
In January 2013, “Selling Company” shifted to a holding company structure, changed its name, and at the same time established a new subsidiary to conduct its business. Initially, the company notified the court that it had only changed its name and was the same legal entity as the company that received the deletion order.
However, the company later claimed that “the redirect was done by a subsidiary with a different identity.” Mr. A argued that the use of different claims was a dishonest attitude to evade responsibility and would not be tolerated in court.
Furthermore, he countered the claim that “redirection was not mentioned in the order” with a substantive argument questioning the “purpose of the order.
The performance of the title of obligation (editor’s note: the provisional disposition ordering the deletion of the articles) is to realize and maintain the state in which the relevant designated portions displayed when general users access each of the above URLs are no longer viewable (deleted state).
(omitted) When a general user accessed the URL listed in the title of obligation, he/she was automatically forwarded to a domain (editor’s note: the specific address is listed in the brief) that had exactly the same content as the title of obligation (omitted), and the said display was continuously viewable. (Omitted) This cannot be evaluated as fulfillment of the title of obligation.
(From Mr. A’s brief) Even if the page was formally deleted, as long as the same content was in effect created to be viewed, this is a “default” in violation of the purpose of the deletion order – the argument goes.
The response from “Selling Company” can be found at ……
Friday Digital sent a letter of inquiry to “Selling Company” to inquire about the following two points.
1. In light of the fact that the purpose of the provisional disposition was to resolve the infringement of Mr. A’s right to privacy, the act of redirection resulted in the continuation of that infringement. What is your company’s opinion on the propriety of this action from the socially accepted point of view?
2. After receiving a provisional injunction order, the company redirected the user to another website that contained the same article. Even if this act was done by a subsidiary, it may be incompatible with the attitude of respecting judicial decisions as a whole group. From the perspective of compliance required of a listed company, what is your company’s position on this issue?
The company responded as follows
The matter you have inquired about is currently pending, and since there are differences in opinion between the parties, we are awaiting a judicial decision. Therefore, we will not be able to give you any specific answers regarding this matter, including our company’s opinion. We will sincerely assert the legitimacy of our company in a court of law. Thank you for your understanding.
On the other hand, when we asked Mr. A for his opinion on the situation in which the redirection continued, he responded as follows.
Despite the fact that the court found that my personal rights had been violated, I was still able to view the same articles by being automatically redirected to an anonymous site with a domain bearing my real name.
This is an act that continues to constitute a substantial infringement of my rights and is extremely regrettable. We will continue to demand that justice be done through appropriate remedies and fair judgments by the judiciary to prevent similar violations from happening again.
The court replied, “We erased the page, but the content was ‘forwarded . Will the court accept the logic of “ the page has been erased , but the content is ‘forwarded’ “? The court’s decision will have an impact on the future of online speech.
