BOARD OF MANAGEMENT OF SALESIAN SECONDARY COLLEGE (LIMERICK) – Court Ruling (Ireland, 2021)

An account on Instagram posted inappropriate, vulgar and sexual messages about staff at Salesian Secondary School in Limerick. For example, some messages ridiculed staff's personal appearance, weight, and sexuality. The photos accompanying the messages did not depict school staff but were sourced from the internet. The account also featured the school's address, crest, and name, and referred to its official website. The messages were deleted and the account taken down after the school's solicitor posted a request on the account. The school was also able to access the password via a student. The board of management of the school brought an application in the Irish Court seeking an order that Facebook Ireland, who owns Instagram, to disclose all data it holds which evidences the identity of the person(s) behind the account, including name(s), address, contact details, and IP address. The school authorities had previously contacted Facebook Ireland requesting information with a view to identifying the individuals. Facebook responded stating that they could not disclose user information to a private third party without a court order or request from law enforcement. The High Court judge, Mr. Justice Garrett Simons, considered it necessary to refer a number of questions in the case to the CJEU for a preliminary ruling, pursuant to Article 267 of the TFEU. In particular: * Do the rights of privacy, data protection, and freedom of expression conferred under the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU ('the Charter') imply a right, in principle, to post material anonymously on the internet (subject always to any countervailing objective of public interest)? If so, is this right qualified in the case of the students and staff of a secondary school? * What is the threshold to be met under the GDPR and/or the Charter before the provider of a social media platform can be compelled to disclose, to a third party, information whic