Facebook pages are public space, not private, Romania’s High Court of Cassation and Justice (ICCJ), which is the country’s highest court, has ruled.

“The Facebook social network can’t be equated with a mailbox, in terms of controlling the posted message. A person’s personal profile on Facebook, although accessible only to a small number of people, is still public space, as any of the <<friends>> can distribute the information posted by the page owner,” according to a Supreme Court’s decision, quoted by Hotnews.ro.

The court made this decision in a case in which a public employee was sanctioned by Romania’s National Council against Discrimination (CNCD) for a message posted on his Facebook page.

He was fined some EUR 225 for “nationalist propaganda”. He contested the decision arguing that what he wrote on Facebook was private, but his appeal was rejected first by the Mures Appeal Court and then by Romania’s Supreme Court, both ruling that Facebook pages are public space.

This is the first decision of this kind in Romania, where Facebook currently has more than 7 million users. This could also be an example for future decisions in similar cases, although in the Romanian law system, which is based on the French system, each case is judged separately, and not based on precedent.

editor@romania-insider.com