Last updated 10 November 2025

A publisher is anyone who communicates defamatory matter to a third party.

Set out below are some case examples where consideration was given to who can be a publisher.

In the case of Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd v Voller; Nationwide News Pty Limited v Voller; Australian News Channel Pty Ltd v Voller [2021] HCA 27, Mr Voller commenced defamation proceedings against three media companies regarding comments posted by third parties about him on the respective Facebook pages of the media companies. The High Court found that the media companies were publishers of comments made by others on their public Facebook pages. The acts of the media companies in facilitating, encouraging and thereby assisting the posting of comments by Facebook users determined that the media companies were publishers of those comments. Companies cannot rely on lack of knowledge of the material posted (or lack of intention to publish them) on their social media pages to deny that they are responsible for publishing the third-party comments.

In contrast to the outcome in Voller, in the case of Google LLC v Defteros [2022] HCA the defendant (Google LLC) was found not to be a publisher. Google LLC had been accused of defaming a pub bouncer turned criminal lawyer for providing the search result of a defamatory article concerning the lawyer. The High Court found that Google LLC acted as reference provider only and had no participation in any way in publishing the article.