What is the ruling on accessing news that covers a scandal involving a specific individual, without disseminating it? And is this considered scrutinizing private matters if the reader seeks out the details himself on social media platforms?

Western media has made tracking the personal lives of celebrities part of its function, and some media professionals in Muslim societies have imitated it. This reprehensible act then spread to social media, developing into fabrication and deception. A Muslim must avoid perusing these topics. If they are about a person whose backbiting is unlawful, then perusing them is consenting to backbiting, which is forbidden, based on the Prophet's (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: "When a sin is committed on earth, whoever witnesses it and dislikes it is like one who was absent from it, and whoever was absent from it and approved of it is like one who witnessed it." If they are about a person whose backbiting is permissible due to their open sinfulness, then they must also be avoided because of the corruption they contain, which trivializes and spreads evil, and in which truth is mixed with falsehood. Permissible backbiting is for a righteous purpose and not merely for denigration.