A Florida appeals court backs Facebook in dismissing a case over a cloned account

social media — Social media apps on an iPhone. Illustration by hapabapa via iStock for WMNF News.

A Florida appeals court Wednesday backed Facebook’s argument that it should be dismissed from a lawsuit filed by an ammunition company that alleged an account was cloned on the Facebook Marketplace platform.

The company, Grind Hard Holdings, LLC, filed the lawsuit after it discovered an unknown Facebook user cloned its account, solicited orders for ammunition and did not deliver the ammunition, according to Wednesday’s ruling by a panel of the 3rd District Court of Appeal.

In addition to filing suit against the unknown user, identified as John Doe, the company sued Facebook in Miami-Dade County circuit court.

It sought to suspend the fraudulent account and to obtain documents to identify the unknown user, Wednesday’s ruling said.

But Facebook is part of Meta Platforms, Inc., which is incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in California.

It said the case should be dismissed because of a lack of jurisdiction in Florida courts.

The panel agreed, reversing a circuit judge’s decision.