STUDENT Low Wei Xiang was surfing the Internet when he spotted a blog with the photo of his best friend, Koh Yan Min, on it.

But what really caught his eye were the 'rude remarks' that the two bloggers behind www.wearemean.blogspot.com had posted about Yan Min.

Among other things, Kesna and Lesly - as they called themselves - criticised Yan Min's dress sense and the way he looked. According to Wei Xiang, the two girls regularly post pictures of strangers to poke fun at them.

To top it all, the 18-year-old said that he subsequently found out that the girls had used other people's photographs to represent themselves on the blog site.

This prompted him to write to The Sunday Times, asking: 'If insulting people online is not illegal, surely passing off someone else's photo as one's own, and thus hurting that person's reputation in the process, must be?'

The bloggers could not be reached for comment but an entry on the site has them saying: 'We are mean and we are not shy about it...You can't stop us and we're not doing anything wrong.'

Not so, according to lawyers Click spoke to, who note that what they are accused of doing could be wrong on several counts.

To begin with, 'grabbing' or taking someone's photo and reproducing it elsewhere without permission is already an infringement of copyright.

Mr Bryan Tan, lawyer at Keystone Law Corporation, said: 'The copyright belongs to the person who took the photo, thus legal actions can be taken against the people who use his photo without approval.'

Hiding behind someone else's photo to post criticisms could also mean having committed defamation - against the people whose 'identities' they assumed and those they make negative remarks about.

Mr Adrian Tan, director of Drew & Napier, said: 'It is definitely a malicious and hurtful thing to do and there is no excuse for it.

'If the matter is brought to court, the judge will be likely to treat the case seriously.'

Regular bloggers interviewed said some bloggers are lulled into a false sense of anonymity online, but vigorously put down the practice of 'misusing' photos.

Undergraduate Sindy See, 21, said: 'People who do such things think that they will not be caught, which encourages them to continue with their acts.

'I think that the authorities should do something about it as I certainly do not want people passing themselves off as me online.'

That blogs are in the public domain also means that bloggers have to exercise discretion about what they put up.

Undergraduate Colin Lim, 23, said: 'If I want to blog about a sensitive topic, I will privatise that entry as I do not want to get into any legal trouble.'

'We are mean and we are not shy about it...You can't stop us and we're not doing anything wrong.'
KESNA AND LESLY, the two girls behind the blog www.wearemean.blogspot.com

This article first appeared in ST on January 14, 2007