Posting on Facebook is akin to a pastime for some, but as one Vittoriosa man has discovered, reacting like a loose cannon can be very costly.

Lawrence Grech was just last week condemned to pay Transport Minister Joe Mizzi €7,000 in damages after the court ruled that his foul-mouthed rant was libellous.

Mr Grech used a string of colourful and offensive adjectives to criticise the minister for roadworks that had fallen behind in the street where he lived.

Had the man stopped at foul language, he might have escaped punishment but Mr Grech went one step further, accusing the minister of being corrupt.

This, according to Magistrate Francesco Depasquale, was unacceptable behaviour and had to be condemned.

READ: €7,000 fine for insulting minister on Facebook

In a strongly worded ruling, the magistrate said it was wrong for people to sit behind the computer screen and abuse of social media by offending and attacking others on the pretext that anyone could say what they want.

“It is clear that social media users are not conscious of the impact information or words they decide to publish on social media such as Facebook have in today’s world, not least the damage caused each time they frivolously and capriciously pass comments on third parties… irreparable damage that can cause havoc in a person’s life,” the magistrate said.

The judgment was not the first to involve a Facebook comment, but the €7,000 awarded in damages did shock a lot of people.

Mr Mizzi subsequently renounced the damages after the Prime Minister intervened and Mr Grech apologised for his actions. But the magistrate’s ruling did have a ‘chilling’ effect on Facebook users.

The ruling highlighted the lack of digital and media literacy prevalent in society, according to Martin Debattista, an educator and technology journalist.

The explosion of technological tools has caught society unprepared, he added.

“We have witnessed people who last wrote something when they were in secondary school and who suddenly started posting on Facebook, oblivious of the implications their words could have.”

Mr Debattista said the Grech case was not the first of its kind and would definitely not be the last. It is through education that this loose cannon approach can be addressed.

“The only way to minimise the problem is to offer digital literacy education that informs people of the benefits of online tools and teaches them how to avoid the pitfalls, because very few understand that an online post or photo creates a digital record that could remain forever,” Mr Debattista warned.

According to lawyer Michael Zammit Maempel, the judgment was well researched and in line with trends abroad that regard the internet and social media as a space that is not a free-for-all.

“I suspect that had the word ‘corrupt’ not been used, the judgment may have been different, because other offensive words such as ‘cuckold’ could have fallen within the tolerance level one would expect when they are addressed towards public figures and politicians,” said Dr Zammit Maempel.

However, he noted that the court had no qualms in dismissing outright the defendant’s claim that the Press Act did not apply to Facebook posts.

The magistrate said a Facebook post fell within the law’s description of “any other published material”, throwing out the defence’s argument.

“In a way, this judgment proves what we [IT law experts] were saying when the government proposed the new media law last month: that existing legislation adequately covered all aspects of publishing, including the online medium, and our courts have always interpreted [publishing] this way,” Dr Zammit Maempel said.

Where does this leave Facebook users? Well, the main message is that Facebook cannot be used to spew forth anything that comes to mind.

And if you thought €7,000 in damages was steep, it was not the uppermost limit established at law. Under existing legislation, the maximum in libel damages stands at €11,647, and proposed legislation aims to increase this to €20,000.

Maybe, the rule of thumb would be the one suggested by columnist Josanne Cassar on her Facebook wall: “Would you say the same thing to someone’s face instead of on FB? If not, then delete.”

Whether that suffices for some is another question altogether.