With decision no. 7781\/2026 of the Single-Member First-Instance Court of Athens, which concerned a debtor’s application to be placed under the favorable provisions of Law 3869\/2010 on over-indebted natural persons due to an alleged unjustified and permanent inability to pay, issues were raised regarding the use of public posts on the Facebook website as evidence in civil proceedings.<\/p>\n
According to the applicable legislation, in order for a debtor to benefit from the favorable treatment of being included in the provisions of Law 3869\/2010, they must submit a sincere declaration regarding their assets and income, both during the procedure commencing with the submission of the application for inclusion and during the debt settlement period. In this context, the debtor must also report assets which, according to their own subjective assessment, may even be without value or without a likelihood of liquidation or collection, since the sole authority competent to be informed of and evaluate them is the court.<\/p>\n
In the present case, the bank invoked the aforementioned declaration of the debtor to argue that it constitutes an insincere declaration, as the debtor, among other things, did not respond truthfully to the bank’s allegations regarding her active involvement in her sister’s individual business. This active involvement emerged from public posts on the Facebook website, which also featured business cards bearing the names of both the debtor and her sister. Consequently, prospective customers were cultivated with the belief that the debtor continues to actively participate in the promotion and sale of the business’s jewelry products.<\/p>\n
The insincerity of the declaration lays both in the fact that the debtor claimed her name appeared only on the business sign, since it emerged from the posts submitted by the bank on the aforementioned social media platform that business cards had also been printed, and in the fact that the post was made in 2022, which was during the time of the discussion of the debtor’s pending application, when she herself assured in her written submissions that the only assistance she provided to her sister took place during the lockdown period.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, the court ruled that even if the debtor’s sister had voluntarily included the debtor’s name on the aforementioned business website, the latter was obliged upon submitting her procedural documents, both her proposals before the first-instance court and her pending appeal, to mention this oversight, which she failed to do. Consequently, her insincere declaration could not be attributed to slight negligence.<\/p>\n
The debtor raised an objection of inadmissibility regarding these items of evidence, arguing that the use of Facebook posts violates data protection legislation and the right to privacy. However, the court dismissed the argument, stating that these were public posts on the debtor’s Facebook page regarding her sister’s business, freely accessible to everyone, especially since their purpose was to advertise the professional activity of the debtor’s sister, with whom the debtor had maintained a General Partnership until 2012.<\/p>\n
It was also emphasized that in the case of Facebook, a user has the ability to adjust privacy settings on their profile if they wish to restrict the circle of people who have access to it, their photos, and generally their posts, meaning they can restrict access to their information, a choice the debtor opted not to make. Moreover, in accordance with decision no. 1\/2017 of the Plenary session of the Supreme Court of Greece (Areios Pagos), even assuming the allegation that these posts were private was true, based on the principle of proportionality, the aforementioned items of evidence, even if they had been unlawfully acquired, could still be taken into account by the court upon weighing the conflicting rights.<\/p>\n
This decision is important because it highlights the heightened evidentiary weight of digital data in modern civil litigation. It underscores that public posts on social media and the failure to utilize privacy settings can be lawfully leveraged to counter inaccurate claims, serving as a reminder that our digital footprint carries direct legal consequences.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
With decision no. 7781\/2026 of the Single-Member First-Instance Court of Athens, which concerned a debtor’s application to be placed under the favorable provisions of Law 3869\/2010 on over-indebted natural persons due to an alleged unjustified and permanent inability to pay, issues were raised regarding the use of public posts on the Facebook website as evidence… <\/p>\n