People commenting online are generally giving their opinions, not making statements of fact. Statements of opinion are not defamatory. My opinion is that given

People commenting online are generally giving their opinions, not making statements of fact. Statements of opinion are not defamatory. My opinion is that given the evidence in the article, this guy was probably was selling fake vaccination passports. I also hold the opinion that OJ Simpson is probably a murderer, despite his criminal acquittal. News organizations generally try to split their coverage into fact and opinion sections. It would be inappropriate to insert opinion into a factual article, but they can and frequently do weigh in on legal matters in opinion sections. The bar for defamation there is usually actual malice, so in reality it's extremely hard to prevail in suing a news organization for defamation.