Treading the legal minefield of message boards

At what point does a rumour become a fact?

What about once it's been published online? After all, the internet is a great source of rumours dressed up as fact - many sites make it their stock in trade. Others get dragged into the argument against their will.

There have been famous instances of people using the web when they have an axe to grind. When the Friends Reunited message boards became the place for naming and shaming teachers accused of child abuse, there was understandable outcry from the education sector.

When an embittered girlfriend wanted the world to know about her boyfriend's holiday romp with another woman she turned to the message board of his favourite football club and went public with her grievance.

Whether these claims were true or not almost became an irrelevancy. By publishing the details in the public domain the damage was done. For the record, Friends Reunited last year saw its first libel case settled in favour of one defamed teacher.

Since the initial outcry, Friends Reunited has bee forced to moderate its message boards - but while the names have changed, the problems have not gone away.

This week silicon.com heard of serious goings-on at New York-based networking consultancy ThruPoint, which appears to have fallen foul of a posting on a message board run for former employees.

It is alleged that this firm is about to undergo a major restructuring at a number of offices in Europe. The allegations are based on a leaked document - seen by silicon.com - which is now at the centre of an investigation by the firm.

The ThruPoint contact site published the details but promptly removed them after the administrator of the website was served with a court order.

The problem? The source of the information and the means by which it came to appear online are dubious. As such, the very fact that a security breach is involved means ThruPoint has the law on its side.

So far the company has refused to comment on the specifics of the posting but admitted the leak, blaming it on a "disgruntled employee".

Returning to the original question, at what point does a rumour become a fact? It would appear to be whenever the individual lacks the legal clout to intervene.