I live in the middle east, and two weeks back I left a negative factual review on a certain hostel in Abu Dhabi. They gave me a scare threat today, saying that they will file a police case for this. I responded by blocking them. They responded with contacting another one of my family member with the same, stating that blocking them would only increase the problem.
Is what they say really correct? Does blocking communications with those giving legal threats make things worse?
There does seem to be a meme in the UAE of people threatening legal action for negative reviews, as a form of defamation. The police will simply tell them that this is not a crime, go hire a lawyer if you want to sue them. If you block them, perhaps they don't have any other way to contact you (seems that was the point of blocking them), which means that you cannot receive their offer "If you pay us AED 1,000 we will not sue you", which could be a problem if they win their court case. Still, it is perfectly legal to ignore or block them, up to the point that you are actually served with legal papers. When they actually sue you, "blocking" is irrelevant, they will hire a process server to hand you the legal papers that command you to appear in court.
