United States of America: Dismissed Lawsuit on Responsibility for Hosting Images of Child Pornography on Website (Jane Does v. Reddit)

On 30 May 2023, the US Supreme Court declined to hear the Jane Does v. Reddit lawsuit (21-56293) on the platform's responsibility for hosting images of child pornography on its website. Upon request, the platform removed the respective images, although it did not remove all subsequent reposts. The dispute centered around Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), which grants online platforms broad immunity from legal responsibility for user-generated content. At issue in the case was a carve-out on S.230 of the CDA stating that it did not apply to civil claims regarding the crime of sex-trafficking of children. The petitioners had appealed against an appeals court's decision that this exception to S.230 in civil cases would only apply where the respondent (Reddit) had themselves committed the crime in question, not where others had committed the crime. Instead, the petitioners argued that the exception should also apply where a defendant "knowingly benefits" "from participation in a venture" constituting such a crime. The Supreme Court denied the petition for writ of certiorari, meaning that the case would not be reviewed in a full case by the Supreme Court.