Cease and desist letters for online defamation

Sometimes the cheapest thing that works. Sometimes the reason a small problem becomes a public one.

When it tends to work

• The recipient is an identifiable business or professional with their own reputation exposed.
• The statement is clearly false and provably so, in a way a non-lawyer can see in one reading.
• The recipient has no audience and no incentive to escalate.
• The letter is proportionate, specific and unemotional.

When it backfires

Send an aggressive letter to an individual with a following, a journalist, or anyone connected to a community that dislikes legal threats, and the letter itself becomes content. It gets posted, annotated and shared, and the original item acquires an audience it never had.

This is the single most common own goal in reputation work. The letter is cheap; the amplification is not.

Ask one question before sending: what happens if this letter is published in full tomorrow?

What a well-drafted letter contains

Precise identification of the statements at issue, quoted exactly. A clear explanation of why each is false, with reference to evidence. A specific requested action and a reasonable deadline. A measured tone.

What it should not contain: threats beyond what you would actually do, claims about statements that are plainly opinion, or language that reads badly when screenshotted. Have counsel draft it. A letter that overreaches damages your position if the matter ever proceeds.