Magali Berdah had already filed a complaint in April 2023 against Twitter, but the investigation opened by the Paris prosecutor's office had been closed “on the grounds that no offense was sufficiently characterized”, explained the public prosecutor on Wednesday.
What role do networks play in cyberbullying?
In November 2023, the “queen of influencers” again filed a complaint, this time with the creation of a civil party, and obtained referral to an investigating magistrate.
This judicial information, of an unprecedented nature, should allow “the justice system to assess the role of platform My Antonin Gravelin-Rodriguez, Rachel-Flore Pardo and Elie Touitou.
The period covered by Magali Berdah's complaint extends before and after the purchase of the platform by American billionaire Elon Musk. But critics accusing the network of serving as an echo chamber for online hatred did not wait for this change in ownership.
However, it is rare for proceedings for cases of online harassment to go as far as the criminal justice system.
Online hatred, lack of moderation
In civil matters, Twitter was notably taken to court in France by six associations from 2020, and ordered in March 2023 by the Court of Cassation to detail its means of combating online hatred. And since its takeover by Mr. Musk, accusations linked to the lack of moderation have multiplied. According to the Australian regulator, the new owner of the network has fired some 1,200 people responsible for moderating content.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), an organization fighting the spread of hate online, has repeatedly pointed out the platform's lack of reaction to the spread of hateful content.
In the case of Ms. Berdah, the complainant accuses the social network in particular of having ignored the alerts sent on the moderation platform or the formal notices formulated by its lawyers, according to the source close to the case.
Crusade against “influvoleurs”
In addition to his indictment for cyberstalking against Magali Berdah, the “Duke of Boulogne”, who now lives in the United States, is also placed under the more favorable status of assisted witness for acts of death threats and concealment of an offense of invasion of privacy.
In this case, Booba is notably accused of “at least 487 messages on social networks directly targeting her” between May 2022 and May 2023.
The rapper strongly contests this. Instead, he explains that he has launched, alongside a collective “helping victims of influencers”, into a crusade against those he calls “influvoleurs”, denouncing multiple scams against Internet users.
Denunciations and personal attacks
Some of his publications have received wide attention and are fueling a wider debate on the lucrative influencer sector. But his methods of denunciation call into question justice. Because the rapper uses, among other things, personal attacks and unsourced videos, notably since May 2022 against Magali Berdah, founder of the influencer agency Shauna Events.
In addition to the instruction targeting Booba, 28 people were sentenced in Paris, accused of having participated in the “pack” cyberharassment of Magali Berdah, particularly via Twitter.
