Abstract:

The emergence of social networks has led to significant changes in our society. Unfortunately, these changes created the opportunity for some members of society to misuse social networks for improper propose such as impersonating others. Thus online impersonation can be defined as pretending to be someone else online. Under defamation law, a case of defamation can be made out if the effect of words published by an impersonator tends to lower the reputation of a victim in the eyes of right-thinking members of the public. The existing law on defamation law in Malaysia is the Defamation Act 1957. There are cases of online defamation and currently, no cases of online impersonation in Malaysia. Meanwhile in the United Kingdom, the Defamation Act 2013 ('the Act') came into force on 1 January 2014. One of the changes in the Act, raises the questions on how to determine the serious harm of a statement made. The purpose of this paper is to examine and analyse the extent of defamation law in Malaysia as a cause of action if a victim of online impersonation suffers loss to his reputation. This paper will further identify the gaps in the existing law on defamation in Malaysia and provide possible suggestions.