[wkat4242]

In Holland too. Even if someone sues you maliciously, you still have to pay the state a fee to be heard. Otherwise the judgement will fall to the enemy party by default.

You can recuperate this cost from them when you win but you're still out of pocket for your time and the money until you manage to cash it from them which can be hard. And they can keep doing it. The system is very unfairly biased in favour of people with lots of money

[gtirloni]

This is pretty absurd to me.

I'm not a lawyer so don't quote me on this, but here in Brazil, it seems the losing side has to pay the winning side's lawyers and other expenses. It's not clear cut how much will be paid and there are different rates but the message seems to be clear: don't sue willy-nilly because there will be consequences, so make sure you have a case.

[iudqnolq]

Imagine you have an 80% chance of winning but Google will spend millions of dollars defending against your lawsuit. Is suing them worth the risk of a judgement that will ruin your life in perpetuity?

That's why in the US the losing side only has to pay if they committed some kind of misconduct.

There's a fair argument for both systems though, I just want to point out the American system isn't clearly absurd.

Edit: To a certain extent you can control your own costs. You might find a lawyer willing to donate their time, or you might find a scrappy team willing to take on Google for less money. But Google will always hire a top firm with high billing.

[wkat4242]

You can get it back from them, the judge would normally assign all costs to the losing party. However actually getting it can be difficult as the court doesn't bother to help with that.