False rumours of corruption and fraud bolstered with fabricated screenshots of hackers’ chatlogs that circulated on Facebook amongst the tight-knit New Zealand-Vietnamese community have been finally laid to rest with the High Court awarding nearly
False rumours spread via Facebook end with $842k defamation award
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Rumours spread on Facebook amongst the Vietnamese-New Zealander community have seen almost $1m in defamation damages awarded against the posters. Photo / 123RF
After Nguyen engaged lawyers to contest these false claims, she was sent a series of screenshots and videos “purporting to show conversations between Ms Nguyen and a 17-year-old hacker based in Vietnam named Tran Minh Doan, in which Ms Nguyen flirts with him and hires him to disable Facebook groups and pages”.
These screenshots were then also circulated widely on Facebook by accounts the High Court found were linked to the defendants.
Justice Christine Gordon noted in her ruling: “There is expert evidence which established these documents are falsified and this was subsequently accepted by the defendants.”
The expert evidence for the plaintiffs was provided by former New Zealand Herald data journalist Keith Ng, who found that the documents purportedly to be from hackers in Vietnam were created locally and had New Zealand timestamps and there was also evidence Dang was involved in their production.
This evidence was accepted by Justice Gordon: “I do find on the balance of probabilities that he [Dang] was involved in commissioning the fake documents and/or was involved in some of the fabrication himself.”
The proceedings at the High Court at Auckland were determined by formal proof after the defendants, despite having been served, took no steps to defend themselves. A hearing took place on July 18, with the final judgement delivered late last week.
Justice Gordon awarded nearly a million dollars in damages and costs, noting that for Nguyen: “The defamatory publications are all the more serious because they destroyed her reputation within the very community to which she had dedicated her life since moving to New Zealand in 2011.”
Dang Dinh was ordered to pay $395,000, including $30,000 in punitive damages for his role in circulating or fabricating the hacker chatlogs. Mai Pham was ordered to pay $225,000, Julie Fam $100,000 and Minh Nguyen $60,000. The plaintiff was also awarded $62,307 in costs.
Matt Nippert is an Auckland-based investigations reporter covering white-collar and transnational crimes and the intersection of politics and business. He has won more than a dozen awards for his journalism - including twice being named Reporter of the Year - and joined the Herald in 2014 after having spent the decade prior reporting from business newspapers and national magazines.