The role of WhatsApp chat in a trial – planetcellulare.it
What role can a WhatsApp conversation have in a Court trial: here’s what the judges say
The messages on WhatsApp do they have legal value? According to Italian judges, yes. What we could define as simple conversations with acquaintances, relatives or friends, could become evidence in a trial in a Court. In fact, one of our chats can become a factor in our favor, such as being used against us in an investigation conducted by magistrates in the Palace of Justice.
The role of WhatsApp messages within the process
The Italian judges considered important the WhatsApp chatswhich within investigative cases can help to reach the truth and above all to reconstruct a certain matter around a judicial episode. A weapon that could put the owner of that conversation in difficulty, considering how first of all he could see his cell phone seized for an inspection by the investigators.
What are chats for?
According to the ruling number 49016/2017 of the CassationWhatsApp chats have evidentiary value in a judicial process. As the judges have defined, such conversations must be supported by certain IT devices. In this case, for the magistrates, it is enough that it is a computer, a tablet or a simple smartphone with the application for the instant messaging platform.
Precisely because of the legal value of WhatsApp chat, where even malicious people can coordinate for a criminal action, a technical expertise of the IT medium. In this case, the people involved will see the seizure of their digital products useful for carrying on that type of conversation on the chat: the technicians will try to find the information necessary for the investigators’ investigations, carefully scrutinizing your messages and everything that can allude to the situations dictated by the process.
As the lawyers explain, each person is required to use WhatsApp wisely and conscientiously. The application can become a place of entertainment, but inadvertently also be a means that puts you in front of ambiguous and compromising statements. As numerous computer scientists have explained in the past, the level of secrecy on the platform is low for this very reason. We must avoid giving rise to compromising conversations, even in terms of negative judgment towards some particular person. Furthermore, it is always better to avoid sending or receiving intimate photos, even with your partners to whom you have been romantically linked for years: the messages could be intercepted, allowing unwanted third parties to see your intimate world. The platform has its uses, but like the rest of social media it must always be used with judgment and conscience to avoid running into problems.
