Blog
Legal News
Top five mistakes when drafting website privacy policies
Éloïse Gratton July 6, 2015
Many organizations remain very broad in their website privacy policies on the use made of the information collected. Recent bill S-4, the Digital Privacy Act, the federal government’s latest attempt to reform PIPEDA was proclaimed last month and proposes a revised “valid consent” provision (PIPEDA, s. 6.1), by shifting from a subjective standard to a more objective standard. To […] Read more
Events
Practical De-Identification
Éloïse Gratton June 30, 2015
I will be participating at the Practical De-Identification program organized by the Future of Privacy Forum and Ernst & Young taking place in Washington on July 9th, 2015. De-identification is a critical element in many privacy programs, and is an important part in every privacy practitioner’s toolbox. However, the complex technical, legal, and policy landscape around de-identification can be […] Read more
News
Fitbit data used to self-incriminate its user
Éloïse Gratton June 29, 2015
I posted a blog a few months ago about Health-tracking bracelets and privacy issues and raised the fact that health information collected by these self-tracking devices may be used as evidence in a litigation. Kashmir Hill published a piece today entitled “Fitbit data just undermined a woman’s rape claim“. Apparently, according to ABC 27, a woman handed the username and […] Read more
News
Porter Airlines agrees to pay $150,000 for alleged violations of CASL
Éloïse Gratton June 29, 2015
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) today announced that airline company Porter Airlines Inc. agreed to pay $150,000 as part of an undertaking for alleged violations of Canada’s anti-spam legislation (CASL). It is reported that once made aware of the investigation by the CRTC, the airline company was cooperative and immediately took corrective actions to comply […] Read more
News
Douez Privacy class action: B.C. law does not apply to Facebook
Éloïse Gratton June 19, 2015
Douez launched a class-action lawsuit in Vancouver against Facebook for breach of privacy over their “Sponsored Stories” program which is now defunct. She was arguing that the program manipulated users for commercial gain and that it was violating Facebook users’ privacy by using their photos in commercial ads without their prior consent. In a decision issued today, the B.C. […] Read more
Legal News
The Digital Privacy Act ( Bill S-4) was proclaimed today
Éloïse Gratton June 18, 2015
Bill S-4, the Digital Privacy Act, the federal government’s latest attempt to reform PIPEDA was proclaimed earlier today. I had testified on S-4 back in March, so for my thoughts on this Bill, please click here. You will find a summary of the Bill below: New breach notification requirement Notification and reporting was voluntarily effected based on […] Read more
Legal News
Online Access to Court Decisions and Privacy Implications
Éloïse Gratton June 16, 2015
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner recently issued a finding pertaining to Romania-based website Globe24h.com which is republishing Canadian court decisions, allowing them to be indexed by search engines, and demanding a fee for them to be removed. This website received a great deal of media attention in the last year. Apparently, 27 complaints were filed […] Read more
Videos
Presentation on Emails and Privacy in the Workplace – May 7, 2015 (French)
You can view my presentation on emails and privacy from an employer-employee perspective (French). This presentation was made at the “Courriel Express. Après-midi d’étude interdisciplinaire” (Email and interdisciplinary study) event taking place on May 7th 2015, and organized by Vincent Gautrais and Marie Demoulin (teachers at the ÉBSI) in the context of the LCCJTI.ca project of the University of Montreal. Read more
News
Should users have an expectation of privacy in old or deleted emails?
Éloïse Gratton June 4, 2015
It was reported today that Twitter shut down a site that saved politicians’ deleted tweets. I also recently came across an interesting article entitled Your old emails are fair game for federal eyes. The article discusses the fact that in the U.S., under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, feds would be entitled to access 180-day old emails, texts and […] Read more
Legal News
Targeted Advertising and the “Reasonable Expectations” of Customers
Éloïse Gratton June 2, 2015
An article was published yesterday which pertains to Netflix testing ads surrounding its shows. An update was then posted beside the title of the article to specify: “only its own” to refer to the fact that Netflix would be testing ads to promote its own products and not enabling third party ads. This brings forward the issue […] Read more