Defamation Complaints

1. Legal basis and scope

Under section 5 of the Defamation Act 2013, the operator of a website has a defence to a defamation claim about a statement posted on it if it can show that it was not the operator who posted the statement. ChatNow does not write what its users post, and section 5(12) confirms that moderating users' statements does not remove the defence. The defence is defeated only if the complainant could not identify the poster, gave the operator a notice of complaint, and the operator failed to respond in accordance with the Defamation (Operators of Websites) Regulations 2013. This page is our published procedure for responding to such notices.

It applies to any statement posted by a user on ChatNow, in a public room, a private message, a profile bio, an image or a voice note. The Act and the Regulations apply in England and Wales; section 10 covers the rest of the United Kingdom.

2. Before you send a notice

• Can you identify the poster? Under section 5(4) you can "identify" a person only if you have enough information to bring proceedings against them; a username alone is not enough. If you can identify the poster, your claim lies against them directly and the procedure on this page does not apply, though you may still report the content to us under the Terms (section 9).
• Is the statement defamatory of you? It must refer to you and its publication must have caused, or be likely to cause, serious harm to your reputation (section 1 of the Act). Rudeness and honest opinion are not, in themselves, defamation.
• Is it also something else? Threats, harassment, intimate images and impersonation are dealt with faster through Report content and safety@chatnow.fr. You may use both routes.
• Act promptly. Guest content is deleted automatically 24 hours after the guest leaves; note the date, time, room and username when you see the statement.

3. What a valid notice of complaint must contain

Email legal@chatnow.fr with the subject "Defamation notice of complaint". Section 5(6) of the Act and regulation 2 of the 2013 Regulations require the notice to contain all of the following:

• your full name and an email address at which we can contact you;
• the statement you complain of, set out in full, and where on ChatNow it appears (room or conversation, the poster's username, the date and time, and a screenshot if you have one);
• why the statement is defamatory of you;
• the meaning you attribute to the statement;
• which aspects of the statement you say are factually inaccurate, or are opinions not supported by fact;
• confirmation that you do not have sufficient information about the poster to bring proceedings against them;
• whether you consent to us passing your name and email address to the poster.

If a notice omits any of these, we tell you within 48 hours what is missing and that we cannot act until we receive a complete notice. We do not disclose to the poster anything other than your name and email address, and those only if you consent.

4. What we do within 48 hours

Every 48-hour period on this page is counted from receipt of a complete notice and, as regulation 1(3) provides, excludes Saturdays, Sundays, Good Friday, Christmas Day and bank holidays in England and Wales. Within that period we take one of two courses:

• If we have no means of contacting the poster by private electronic communication (a guest, or a member whose account has been deleted), we remove the statement and tell you in writing that we have done so.
• If we can contact the poster (a registered member, by the email address on their account and their in-app inbox), we send them a copy of your notice, with your name and email address removed unless you consented to their disclosure, and tell them that the statement will be removed unless they respond by the deadline in section 5 and what their response must contain. We confirm to you in writing that we have done so.

5. The poster's five-day window

The poster must respond by midnight at the end of the fifth day after the day on which we sent them your complaint. Their response must state whether they consent to the statement being removed. If they do not consent, it must also give their full name and postal address and state whether they consent to us passing those details to you. We do not extend the deadline.

6. Outcomes

Removal under this procedure is a statutory step, not a finding by ChatNow that the statement is defamatory or that the poster is liable.

7. Guests and anonymous posters

Guests use ChatNow with a username only: no email address, no password. We have no private electronic means of contacting a guest, so a statement posted by a guest is removed within 48 hours of a complete notice under paragraph 3 of the Schedule to the Regulations. Registered members can be contacted by email and in-app inbox, and the full procedure applies to them. Under this procedure we never disclose IP addresses, device data or other records about a user; those are released only under a court order, as described in Law Enforcement & Authorities Guidelines.

8. Repeated statements

If your notice states that the same or a substantially similar statement by the same poster has already been removed under this procedure on two or more occasions, we remove it within 48 hours without contacting the poster again, as paragraph 9 of the Schedule provides. Reposting content removed under this procedure is also a breach of our Acceptable Use Policy and may lead to a mute or ban.

9. Our right to act under the Terms

The section 5 procedure exists alongside, not instead of, our own rules. Whatever stage the procedure has reached, we may remove content, mute or ban a user under the Terms of Service and the Acceptable Use Policy where a statement amounts to harassment, a threat, the publication of private information or another rule breach. Any such decision is notified to the poster with reasons and can be appealed through Complaints & Appeals; removals required by the Regulations themselves are not reversed on appeal, because they are required by law, not by our Terms.

10. Scotland and Northern Ireland

The Defamation Act 2013 and the 2013 Regulations apply to England and Wales only. Defamation law in Scotland is set out in the Defamation and Malicious Publication (Scotland) Act 2021, and in Northern Ireland in the Defamation Act (Northern Ireland) 2022, neither of which provides the section 5 notice procedure. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, send the same information listed in section 3 to legal@chatnow.fr. We consider your complaint under the Terms of Service and the Acceptable Use Policy, within the same timescales, and take the action those documents allow; we tell you the outcome in writing.

11. Records, time limits and legal advice

• We keep a record of every notice, every communication with the poster and every action taken for twelve months, so that we can show the steps we took and when.
• The limitation period for a defamation claim in England and Wales is generally one year from publication (section 4A of the Limitation Act 1980). Our procedure does not stop that clock.
• This page describes our procedure and is not legal advice. If you are considering a claim, take advice from a solicitor or a law centre.