Vasil Kisil & Partners has successfully represented Wikimedia Ukraine NGO in court in the case regarding recognition of a post as false and refuting it.
In July 2020, Wikimedia Ukraine NGO, an independent regional chapter recognized by the Wikimedia Foundation, which is responsible for communicating with the Ukrainian community of volunteers and contributors to Wikipedia.org, published a blog post on the activities of Wikipedia Ukraine NGO – newly established organization, which has no legal connection to Wikimedia Foundation or persons responsible for supporting the free internet-encyclopedia Wikipedia.
The material was intended to explain that Wikipedia Ukraine NGO was not authorized to use the Wikipedia TM and violated the community rules, in particular, by offering to place articles on Wikipedia for pay, without labeling them as paid content; instead, key public figures of this organization were blocked in the free internet-encyclopedia Wikipedia for an indefinite period.
Wikipedia Ukraine NGO filed a claim against Wikimedia Ukraine NGO asking the court to declare the post as false and refuting the same.
Vasil Kisil & Partners’ intellectual property team acted for Wikimedia Ukraine NGO and liaised with the Wikimedia Foundation, the Wikipedia trademark holder.
Attorneys-at-law Ilarion Tomarov and Daria Romashchenko proved in court that the claimant was not entitled to raise claims against some of the statements that did not concern the claimant; that some of the judgments contained in the publication expressed the subjective opinion of Wikimedia Ukraine NGO, which could not be found to be false, with the rest being reliable statements whose evidence is presented, in particular, in the post itself.
The court took into account the fact that the claimant presented no evidence in support of the circumstances alleged. Therefore, the court dismissed the claim and awarded legal fees against Wikipedia Ukraine NGO.
The team has managed to convince the court that, to prove that the statements made in the publication are true, due account should be taken of the local rules of Wikipedia.org, which set out terms and conditions of blocking the users and using the ТМ Wikipedia, and electronic confirmations that the persons referred to in the publication were blocked.