In FilmOn.com v. DoubleVerify, Inc., a lawsuit between two internet companies, the Supreme Court today makes it a bit harder for some defendants to strike a complaint under the anti-SLAPP statute.
The court’s unanimous opinion by Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar holds that the statute — which is designed to quickly dispose of meritless claims that, among other things, arise from a defendant’s constitutional free speech rights “in connection with a public issue or an issue of public interest” — does not cover allegedly inaccurate reports about the content of the plaintiff company’s website that were made by the defendant to its advertiser clients. Stating that “a court must consider the context as well the content of a statement,” the court concludes that the “reports are too tenuously tethered to the issues of public interest they implicate, and too remotely connected to the public conversation about those issues, to merit protection under the [statute].”
The court reverses the Second District, Division Three, Court of Appeal, and it disapproves a 2004 opinion by the Second District, Division One.
