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Can Texas' Supreme Court Force Google to Unmask Anonymous Bloggers?

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"We haven't had a high court decision in our state to determine how hard, or how easy, it should be for a company to unmask an anonymous blogger,” says professor Nicole Casarez.";

Let's say you're angry with your boss.  You go online and vent in an anonymous post. It's therapeutic, sure. But now your boss wants to sue for defamation.  

In Texas, courts haven't settled on guidelines for online defamation. But a little-discussed case before the Texas Supreme Court could help determine if the state can force companies like Google to identify anonymous bloggers.

In the case, an anonymous blogger is accused of defaming Ohio-based auto-dealer support company Reynolds and Reynolds. The company claims to have been defamed in a Google-hosted blog post by an anonymous author, following the company's $2.8 billion merger with Universal Computer Systems. Based on the posts, the author appeared to be an employee upset with the merger.  

KUT's David Brown spoke with University of St. Thomas professor Nicole Casarez to figure out if Texas can force Google to hand over the author’s name – and if Texans really are as anonymous online as they think they are.

David entered radio journalism thanks to a love of storytelling, an obsession with news, and a desire to keep his hair long and play in rock bands. An inveterate political junkie with a passion for pop culture and the romance of radio, David has reported from bases in Washington, London, Los Angeles, and Boston for Monitor Radio and for NPR, and has anchored in-depth public radio documentaries from India, Brazil, and points across the United States and Europe. He is, perhaps, known most widely for his work as host of public radio's Marketplace. Fulfilling a lifelong dream of moving to Texas full-time in 2005, Brown joined the staff of KUT, launching the award-winning cultural journalism unit "Texas Music Matters."
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