We live in a digital age. And at the center of it all is the explosion of social media. The numbers are astonishing. Americans spend 16 minutes of every hour online on social networking sites. More Facebook profiles (5) are created every second than there are people born (4.5). If Facebook were a country, it would have the world’s third-largest population (twice the population of the U.S.); Twitter would be the 12th-largest country. Incredibly, more than a billion tweets are sent every 48 hours, with over 293,000 status updates posted on Facebook every 60 seconds.
With over a sixth of the planet posting content on Facebook alone, it was inevitable that some form of social media would one day find its way into a courtroom. Social media evidence has been seen in personal injury, securities, divorce, insurance, trade secret, medical malpractice, free speech and employment actions, to name a few.
But even before setting foot in court, lawyers face various ethical constraints on the acceptable use of social media.4 These considerations dictate, among other things, the means and manner by which social mediabased evidence may be obtained, collected and utilized and the type of advice given to clients involved in social media.
Reproduced with permission from Social Media Law & Policy Report, 03 SMLR 35, 09/09/2014. Copyright 2014
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