Vivares V. St.

Theresas College
GR No. 202666 September 29, 2014
Velasco, Jr., J. :

Facts:

Graduating high school students at St.Theresas College (STC) were Nenita Julia V. Daluz (Julia) and
Julieene Vida Suzara. While changing into attire for a beach party, Julia, Julienne , and several others took
pictures of themselves in the undergarments and were later uploaded to the online networking website,
Facebook.

Mylene Rheza T. Escudero (Escudero), a computer teacher at STC, discovered from her students about
the pictures uploaded depicting themselves dressed waist-up only in brassieres . Identified by her
students in the photos were Julia and Julienne. Escudero asked her students, through their accounts, to
show other photos of the identified students. Among the photos discovered were:

A) Julia and Julienne drinking hard liquor and smoking cigarettes inside a bar

B) Julia and Julienne wearing clothing that show their entire black brassieres.

Her students claimed that the privacy settings of the photos were not set to be viewed only by the girls.
Upon discovery, Escudero reported the matter to the school authorities. This barred the girls from
attending their graduation rites.

A petition for the issuance of the writ of habeas data was filed. The petitioners, parents of the students
involved, filed on the consideration that their childrens facebook settings were set as friends Only and
the photos belonged to the students and cannot be reproduced without consent, which Escudero did as
a procdure to show it to the STC Officials.

Issue:

Is the writ of habeas data an appropriate remedy.

Ruling:

The writ of habeas data is a remedy available to any person whose right to privacy in life, liberty or
security is violated or threatened by an unlawful act or omission of a public official or employee, or of a
private individual or entity engaged in the gathering, collecting or storing data or information regarding
the person, family, home and correspondence of the aggrieved party.( Rule on Writ of Habeas Data Sec.
1)

It is an independent and summary remedy designed to protect the image, privacy, honor, information,
and freedom of information of an individual, and to provide a forum to enforce ones right to the truth
and to informational privacy. It seeks to protect a persons right to control information regarding oneself,
particularly in instances in which such information is being collected through unlawful means in order to
achieve unlawful ends. (Gamboa v. Chan, G.R. No. 193636, July 24, 2012, 677 SCRA 385.)

STC did not violate petitioners daughters right to privacy

The right of privacy was not violated since Facebook has builtin privacy settings and tools and that non
usage of these tools, would grant no reasonable expectation of informational privacy in the usage of the
site. However, even if these settings were to be used, this does not guarantee that a stranger would be
able to view the private content. A facebook users friend could tag or share contents to people
regardless if they are friends or strangers to the facebook user.