The blogger who penned the now-infamous "skank" hatchet job on model Liskula Cohen is demanding $15 million in damages from Google, accusing thecompany of, in the words of her attorney, "breaching its fiduciary duty to protect her expectation of anonymity."
The blogger, Rosemary Port, told the New York Daily News in an interview over the weekend that Cohen actually "defamed herself" and that Port's right to an opinion should be protected.
To review: Port attacked Cohen on the "Skanks of New York" blog last year, posting suggestive pictures of Cohen and adding comments that called Cohen a "skank," a "ho" and other unsavory terms.
Cohen, a Vogue model, sued Google in January to obtain Port's identity. Google's role in the case is that it owns Blogger.com, the service on which the "Skanks" blog was hosted before it was taken down in March. Last week, a judge ruled in Cohen's favor, ordering Google to give up Port's identity.
In response, Port told the Daily News that she plans to file a $15 million federal lawsuit against Google.
"When I was being defended by attorneys for Google, I thought my right to privacy was being protected. But that fell right through the cracks," Port told the newspaper. "Without any warning, I was put on a silver platter for the press to attack me. I would think that a multi-billion dollar conglomerate would protect the rights of all its users."
Port's attorney, Salvatore Strazzullo, told the Daily News he'd take the case "all the way to the Supreme Court."
The skanks case and Google's role in owning the content raise a number of questions about protecting online anonymity. For the IT security channel specifically, that could mean re-evaluating privacy controls and how certain Web services are liable in cases like these.
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