As social media has entirely transformed how people communicate and share information, it has had an exceptionally profound impact on many areas of law. In particular, defamation, which is the act of communicating to a third-party a false statement about a person, place or object that damages its reputation through spoken or written means. Such statements constitute a crime.

Traditionally, defamation claims were based on statements made in newspapers, magazines or on television but with the rise of social media, they are increasingly being related to online statements made on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.