By Marco Hugo Barsotti MHB 
Bardella and Mediapart’s chats between authentication, privacy, and protection of minors
The download requested by an interlocutor and the report of a public official do not equate to a judicial authorization for publication. The age at the time of the messages matters, but does not alone determine the lawfulness of the investigation.
October 2, 2026
The private conversations from 2013 attributed to Jordan Bardella by Mediapart raise two different issues: how solid the evidence of authenticity is and under what conditions a newspaper can publish messages written when the alleged author was seventeen years old. The formula stating that “Meta validated the messages” risks confusing the two. From the available reports, an acquisition and documentation procedure emerges, not a judicial clearance for their dissemination.
Mediapart published elements on October 1st supporting the investigation into the messages it attributes to the president of the Rassemblement national. Bardella disputes their authorship. According to the method described by the newspaper and reported by RTL, an interlocutor asked Meta to download their Messenger conversation; the extraction was then documented by a huissier. It is the participant in the conversation who requested the data, not a journalist authorized to enter Bardella’s account. [1–2]
Messenger already existed in 2013: Facebook had launched the standalone app for iPhone and Android on August 9, 2011. The date of the messages therefore presents no technological incongruity in itself. [3]
What Meta did
One must distinguish the origin of the archive from the identity of the writer. Returning a conversation preserved by the platform to a user can provide elements regarding the source of the messages, the dates, and the account associated with the sender. This does not automatically equate to certifying that a specific person was physically at the keyboard.
Mediapart maintains that the extraction allows for dating the conversation, excluding subsequent modifications, and linking the interlocutor to the name Jordan Bardella in Facebook’s data. To identify the person behind the account, the newspaper also cites biographical findings: a mother born in Italy, an interview with Le Parisien in 2013, and the failure to pass the Sciences Po entrance exam. These are elements of the publication’s argument, which Bardella contests, not a ruling on authenticity. [2]
The available reconstruction does not prove that Meta conducted an independent investigation into the author or released a conclusive certification to Mediapart. Without examining the original archive, the full report, and any exchanges with the company, it is not possible to further specify the scope of the verifications.
The huissier is not a judge
The huissier de justice is a French public official traditionally tasked with notifying acts, executing judicial decisions, and drafting material observations. The comparison to the Italian judicial officer helps understand some of its functions, but it is not a complete correspondence. Since July 1, 2022, the profession has merged, along with commissaires-priseurs judiciaires, into that of commissaire de justice. [4–5]
The law allows them to make observations even at the request of private individuals, without a prior mandate from a judge. These must concern material facts, excluding evaluations of factual or legal consequences. Except in criminal matters, where they serve as informative elements, they are valid until proven otherwise. [4]
It is therefore not the huissier who “authorizes” the download. Their role may be to observe and record the access, the extraction, and the data displayed, within the limits of the operations actually performed. The report can strengthen the proof of the procedure; it does not grant the newspaper a general right to publish, nor does it certify, on its own, who was using the account thirteen years earlier.
Why a judicial order is not necessarily required
Article 15 of the GDPR recognizes the right to access personal data processed by an organization and to obtain a copy thereof. The CNIL, the French data protection authority, expressly indicates downloading from social networks as a way to exercise this right. A participant can normally recover the conversations present in their account, including received replies: this does not mean they are gaining access to the entire inbox of the other interlocutor. [6–7]
This right is not unlimited: Article 15, paragraph 4, requires respecting the rights and freedoms of others. The presence of the other person’s data requires attention, but it does not automatically make it unlawful to return to the recipient an exchange they were already participating in. The right of access is exercised today even on data kept for years; it does not presuppose that the GDPR was already applicable in 2013. [7]
The absence of a judge’s order therefore does not prove a violation. A direct delivery of private data from Bardella’s account to third parties, without authorization or other lawful basis, would be a different situation from the described procedure.
Downloading does not mean being able to publish
The lawfulness of access does not resolve that of dissemination. Article 9 of the French Civil Code protects private life; Article 226-15 of the Penal Code protects the secrecy of correspondence and includes, under certain conditions of bad faith, the use or disclosure of electronic communications. Mere possession of a message does not authorize any use. Criminal application, however, depends on the circumstances and the elements of the offense: it cannot be deduced from the single word “private.” [8–9]
On a journalistic level, privacy and freedom of information must be balanced. The French Court of Cassation requires assessing the contribution to a debate of general interest, the notoriety of the person, the subject of the report, previous behavior, and the content, form, and consequences of the publication. The GDPR, in Article 85, also provides for the reconciliation between data protection and information, including journalistic purposes. [10–11]
In the case of Bardella, the relevance of political convictions attributed to a national leader can support public interest. This is an argument in favor of publication, not a guarantee of lawfulness. Being a politician does not imply waiving privacy: the choice of published details and the way they are presented must also be justified.
The fact that he was seventeen years old
Protections for minors exist, but they have specific scopes. Recital 38 of the GDPR recognizes the need for specific protection of children’s data. It does not, by itself, introduce a perpetual ban on publishing information dating back to their adolescence. [12]
Article 39 bis of the French Press Law prohibits the identification of minors in certain protected situations, including minors who are victims of crimes, abandoned, or separated from the person to whom they were entrusted. Article L513-4 of the Code of Juvenile Justice also protects the publicity of proceedings and the identity and personality of juvenile offenders. These provisions are not a general ban referring to every old conversation of a seventeen-year-old. Nor can it be assumed that they apply simply because an investigation attributes offensive phrases to an adolescent. [13–14]
There remains a substantial question of proportionality. The young age, the confidential nature of the exchange, the thirteen years passed, and the potential evolution of positions are elements to consider when evaluating the publication and its meaning. It is necessary to distinguish between documenting a political past and presenting adolescent words as automatic proof of current convictions.
The examined rules therefore do not allow declaring the investigation unlawful solely because the messages date back to the alleged author’s seventeen years. They do not allow declaring it lawful either because a Meta download or a report exists. Provenance of data, personal attribution, and legitimacy of publication remain three distinct verifications.
Sources and verification note
- Mediapart, investigation of October 1, 2026
- RTL, reconstruction of the method and the disputes
- Facebook, launch of Messenger, August 9, 2011
- Reunification of professions, article 25
- CNIL, right of access
- GDPR, article 15
- Civil Code, article 9
- Penal Code, article 226-15
- French Cassation, March 11, 2020, n. 19-13.716
- GDPR, article 85
- GDPR, recital 38
- Press Law, article 39 bis
- Juvenile justice, article L513-4
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Source: AudioVisione – AM 1575 News