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The Canadian Privacy Law Blog

The Canadian Privacy Law Blog: Developments in privacy law and writings of a Canadian privacy lawyer, containing information related to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (aka PIPEDA) and other Canadian and international laws.

Post Frequency: 2.3/day

Last Entry: October 07, 2020 at 10:02:01

The British Government plans to step in to the abyss with massive telecom database

Posted on October 16, 2008
The Independent is reporting that the British government is planning to announce a 1 BILLION POUND project that would involve the creation of a database to log every e-mail, telephone call and website click and retain the information for one year. The project seems to be universally panned: the independent reviewer of UK anti-terrorism laws says "as a raw idea it is awful"...

Web 2.0 and online evidence

Posted on October 15, 2008
Chris Pierre of the Evince Blog and I recently had an interesting discussion about privacy and investigations that garner evidence from the internet. You can check it out here: The Evince Blog ť Blog Archive ť Picture and Video Evidence Found on the Web...

British Colubmbia bridge implements plate-based tolling

Posted on October 13, 2008
The Golen Ears Bridge in British Columbia is the first toll highway/bridge in Western Canada to follow the lead of Toronto's 407 ETR to implement electronic tolling using plate identification. Spokespeople are attempting to soothe privacy fears, but I'm not sure it goes far enough: Vehicles crossing Golden Ears Bridge will be tracked, TransLink says ...

National Do Not Call List comes online (and goes offline)

Posted on September 30, 2008
Today is the first day for consumers to add themselves to the Canadian Do Not Call List (https://www.lnnte-dncl.gc.ca/) but the online system has been overwhelmed with people looking to get added to the list. If you want more info on the national DNCL, you can check out some past posts and these resources: Canadian Do Not Call List - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia; C-37, amending the Telecommunciations Act permitting the Do Not Call List; National Do Not Call List (DNCL) info from the CRTCUnsolicited Telecommunications Rules and Amendment to the Unsolicited Telecommunications Rules; And if you're inclined to tell telemarketers not to call you, you should also take advantage of iOptOut, which also appears to be down...

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Unsurprising expansion of UK surveillance project

Posted on September 28, 2008
A system designed to track motorists in the UK is being expanded to collect fifty million automobile movement records for five years, instead of the already intrusive two years originally announced. Alread pervasive CCTV cameras are being upgraded to capture license plates, adding to what is being said to be the largest oracle database in Europe...

More from Ontario courts on warrantless ISP disclosures

Posted on September 24, 2008
This recent case was brought to my attention today: R. v. Ward, 2008 ONCJ 355 (CanLII). The decision is a ruling on a charter motion on whether evidence in a child pornography investigation should be admissible after the police obtained the identity of an internet user from an ISP without a warrant...

Sarah Palin's personal/semi-official e-mail account hacked

Posted on September 18, 2008
Here's an interesting intersection of privacy and access to information. There's been some buzz on the internets suggesting that Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin has been using personal e-mail accounts to thwart freedom of information legislation. But in the past days, someone has hacked into her Yahoo! mail account (gov...

US government tips on avoiding prying eyes of foreign governments

Posted on September 13, 2008
The US Department of Homeland Security is warning government types travelling internationally that their electronic devices may be subject to seizure or intereception. Oh noes! Imagine such a threat to privacy and security! Thank goodness they've provided some tips on how to avoid the prying eyes of oppressive governments...

Globe series on privacy and social networking

Posted on September 13, 2008
The Globe & Mail is running a series on privacy and social networking sites, particularly Facebook. I'm not sure that readers of this blog will be shocked at what's posted online but it's still an interesting read: Friday, September 12, 2008: Faceless no more: Social networking comes with a price Saturday, September 13, 2008: The not-so-private price paid for social networking On Monday, look for Part 2 of the series in Report on Business: Matt Hartley looks at how social networks have affected consumer privacy and reports on the federal privacy commissioner's plans to safeguard consumer information...

Your privacy, your responsibility says Ontario Privacy Commissioner

Posted on September 12, 2008
ITBusiness has an interesting article on the collaboration between the Ontario Privacy Commissioner and Facebook, including a video interview with the commissioner: Your privacy, your responsibility says Ontario Privacy Commissioner.

Nova Scotia introduces and then drops intrusive licence renewal form

Posted on September 10, 2008
Earlier today, the Nova Scotia government came under fire for introducing a new form for driver's licence renewals that asked applicants to say whether they had any kind of mental illness. (Critics: Don?t tie driver?s licence renewal to psychiatric history) Too much information, I say...

Google reduces log retention times

Posted on September 09, 2008
Google has just announced that they are cutting their log retention period in half: from 18 monts to 9 months. From the Official Google Blog: Official Google Blog: Another step to protect user privacy Today, we're announcing a new logs retention policy: we'll anonymize IP addresses on our server logs after 9 months...

PIPEDA self-assessment tool

Posted on September 03, 2008
Just in time for Privacy Awareness Week (last week), the Privacy Commissioner has released a PIPEDA Self-Assessment Tool which is worth checking out.Here's some backgound and further info from the Commissioner's website: News Release: Canada celebrates Privacy Awareness Week by helping businesses improve privacy practices (August 27, 2008) - Privacy Commissioner of Canada Canada celebrates Privacy Awareness Week by helping businesses improve privacy practices Ottawa, August 27, 2008 ?The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) today launched a new tool to help businesses evaluate their privacy practices and compliance with Canada?s private sector privacy law...

Mass surrender of online privacy

Posted on September 02, 2008
One of the most interesting phenomena (at least to me) is that privacy is not only being taken away on a number of fronts, the wider front is the mass surrender of privacy by the millions of people who put loads of personal data online. Some people may think it's ironic that I'm on Facebook or Flickr, but I'm pretty mindful of what I put online and who is my "friend"...

Newly noticed: Photo Attorney

Posted on August 31, 2008
After a very long hiatus, I've been reinfected with the photography bug thanks to acquiring a new digital SLR (some of my recent work is at http://www.privacylawyer.ca/photo or can be found on Flickr here (RSS)). And of course, everything has to do with privacy and civil liberties, so I've also become quite interested in the recent "war against photography" (examples here, here, here and here)...

Future of Privacy in Scientific American

Posted on August 28, 2008
I hope to have the time this weekend to make my way through the incredible variety of privacy-related articles in the most recent Scientific American. Thanks to Library Boy for pointing to this, which I surely would have missed had it not been for his link...

Privacy? We Got Over It.

Posted on August 26, 2008
Yesterday's Wall Street Journal had an interesting Op/Ed on privacy, highlighting contemporary expectations of privacy. Information Age - WSJ.com Privacy? We Got Over It. August 25, 2008; Page A11 In 1988, Congress banned video stores from disclosing the titles of films that people rent...

CBA urges Government to reform Privacy Act

Posted on August 18, 2008
I am currently in Quebec City attending the Canadian Bar Association's annual Canadian Legal Conference. On behalf of the CBA's National Privacy and Access Law Section, I had the honour of presenting a resolution to the National Council calling for reforms to the Privacy Act...

Commissioner launches her "Legal Corner"

Posted on August 17, 2008
The Federal Privacy Commissioner has launched on her website a "Legal Corner" which contains a wide range of resources that will be of interest to practitioners in the area of privacy law. See: http://www.privcom.gc.ca/leg_c/index_e.asp.

Supposedly secure ePassports easily cloned

Posted on August 07, 2008
Cynics, who may say that "chipped" passports are more about control than security, may point to articles like this one to support their position: ?Fakeproof? e-passport is cloned in minutes - Times Online New microchipped passports designed to be foolproof against identity theft can be cloned and manipulated in minutes and accepted as genuine by the computer software recommended for use at international airports...

New pain at the pump: Card skimming

Posted on August 06, 2008
Gas stations and convenience stores are probably among the most reported locales for card skimming, in which debit and credit cards are double-swiped and PINs are observed to commit fraud. Since my own debit card was skimmed a few weeks ago (Canadian Privacy Law Blog: Cloned!), I've stopped paying for gas inside and opting to pay at the pump where I am sure that my card does not leave my hands...

Student complains about Kiwi can cam

Posted on August 06, 2008
Sorry about the headline. I thought I could do beter than the one written by Stuff.co.nz. I have reported on toilet cams on this site in the past, but all of those I've heard about installed by businesses have ended up to be fakes. That is until this report from New Zealand where a drunk student was roughed up by bouncers who were covertly watching him rip down a poster above the urinal...

Who do our privacy laws protect?

Posted on August 06, 2008
I was intereviewed by a New Brunswick journalist last week who was writing an article on how privacy laws can be used in a knee-jerk way to limit access to government information. The article, I expect, is a reaction to a number of stories out of NB where reporters were given the excuse of privacy laws to limit their access to information about potential high-risk offenders, the investigation of a motor vehicle accident that claimed a number of lives and public sector salaries...

Charges following TJX breach investigation

Posted on August 05, 2008
The New York Times is reporting that 11 people have been charged in connection with the massive data breach that dominated the headlines for months after January 2007: 11 Charged in Theft of 40 Million Card Numbers - NYTimes.com ...The charges focus on three people from the United States, three from the Ukraine, two from China, one from Estonia and one from Belarus...

OT: Now appearing on slaw.ca

Posted on August 03, 2008
I've been invited to be a regular contributor on Slaw.ca (the Canadian cooperative weblog on things legal), which is a great opportunity to write about things other than privacy. I'll be posting there on Fridays. My initial contribution is the first of a series on contentment in the practice of law...

SCC to hear case about privacy in garbage

Posted on August 03, 2008
Dan Michaluk reports in All About Information that the SCS is getting ready to hear a case from Alberta about reasonable expectation of privacy in garbage. See: One to Watch - Garbage case ready for hearing at SCC Ť All About Information.

Nomadic laptops can expect the rubber glove treatment

Posted on August 01, 2008
There's been a bit of a buzz lately about laptop inspections by the Department of Homeland Security (Crossing the border? Consider the possibility of laptop searches, Hands off my laptop, Your papers and laptops, please?, US Customs confiscating laptops)...

Google moves to have lawsuit thrown out, arguing complete privacy does not exist

Posted on July 31, 2008
In the "Street View" lawsuit with the Borings (see: Boring lawsuit over Google's "Street View"), Google has filed a motion to have the suit dismissed. Google argues that in the 21st century, complete privacy does not exist. The Smoking Gun has Google's motion here: Google: "Complete Privacy Does Not Exist" - July 30, 2008

Nova Scotia begins consultation on Personal Health Information legislation

Posted on July 31, 2008
The Province of Nova Scotia has for some time been consulting with inside stakeholders on the development of health information legislation. It has just launched a consultation, seeking input from interested parties. I haven't had a chance to look at the discussion paper yet, but I understand they've been using Ontario's PHIPA as the model: Personal Health Information Legislation for Nova Scotia Department of Health Government of Nova Scotia For the past several years the Department of Health has been working with health sector partners on initiatives related to the protection and use of personal health information...

PIPEDA Finding: Residental property appraisal is the owner's personal information

Posted on July 29, 2008
It's been a while since we've seen a published PIPEDA finding that wasn't from a high-profile case. In this case, a bank refused to provide a customer with access to the appraisal conducted by the bank of the customer's property. The bank argued it was about the property and not about him...

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