A U.S. federal court accepted the request by all 13 members of the group Seventeen and their agency HYBE to obtain the identities of those who spread malicious posts.
With this decision, X (formerly Twitter) and Google will hand over the personal information of the users of the accounts in question to HYBE for the purpose of the defamation lawsuit currently underway in a Korean court.
On the 25th (local time), the United States District Court for the Northern District of California ruled in favor of the discovery request filed by HYBE and SEVENTEEN members under Title 28, Section 1782 of the United States Code.
According to the ruling, the target of this legal action is the anonymous account of X on social media. The user of the account in question continuously spread “misogynistic remarks” and “false facts about inappropriate relationships and behavior” targeting the members of Seventeen from around March of last year until December 29th.
On the 25th, the U.S. Federal District Court for the Northern District of California approved the discovery of evidence requested by all members of Seventeen and HYBE.
Accordingly, 13 members of Seventeen (S.Coups, Jeonghan, Joshua, Jun, Hoshi, Wonwoo, Woozi, The8, Mingyu, DK, Seungkwan, Vernon, and Dino) filed a civil lawsuit for defamation and harassment against the anonymous user at the Seoul Central District Court on May 22nd.
On this day, the court ruled that the scope of information requested by HYBE was clear and justified. According to the subpoena approved by the court, X and Google must submit all account identification information (name, nickname, creation date, date of birth, email, contact information, etc.), at least the last 10 access logs and time zone information of the timestamps, the name of the credit card or bank account registered to the account, billing address, phone number, etc.
Considering the administrative burden on platform companies, the court set the deadline for submission of materials at 45 days from the date of service of the subpoena. Accordingly, Hive is expected to secure the identity of the perpetrator of the malicious rumor as early as early 2026 and proceed with the main lawsuit at the Seoul Central District Court.
Source: Seoul Wire
