AN EXPERT in litigation is warning that social media is increasingly being used to summon debtors to court in bankruptcy hearings.
Tom Smith, solicitor at Lancashire law firm Napthens, highlighted a number of cases which have seen websites used to serve proceedings and to notify a debtor that court orders have been made.
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In one case, a debtor proved difficult to contact, so a county court judge decided the debtor was a regular user of Facebook and granted leave that the applicant could use social media to inform him of the terms of the order.
This was understood to be the first time that social media had been used by the courts in insolvency proceedings in England and Wales.
In previous cases, an injunction was served against an anonymous Twitter user in 2009 by sending a direct message.
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