Friday, May 22, 2009

Elsie Law's Daily Dose Of The Law: Shield Laws & Bloggers

New York's "shield law" allows news reporters and journalists the right to refuse to testify in a court in law about any information that they received via their journalistic duties. A New York State Senator and an Assembly Woman want to extend this right to "journalist bloggers." According to The New York Times, they have introduced a bill that will protect bloggers "from being compelled to disclose confidential information or sources in state court.

The New York Times states that: "The current shield law protects professional journalists involved with newspapers, magazines, news agencies, press associations, wire services, radio and television. The bill under consideration would expand the scope of the law to include 'journalist bloggers,' with a blog defined as 'a web site or web page that contains an online journal containing news, comments and offers hyperlinks provided by the writer.'"

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