The University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law and the Privacy Commissioner of Canada are presenting a must-attend symposium on Internet privacy issues on Friday, February 23rd. Confirmed speakers include the Privacy Commissioner, Marc Rotenberg of EPIC, and many of Canada's leading privacy academics. No cost to attend. Details here.
Wiertz Sebastien - Privacy by Sebastien Wiertz (CC BY 2.0) https://flic.kr/p/ahk6nh
Privacy
The Effectiveness of Notice and Notice
The CBC runs a story today on the growing use of "notice and notice" by copyright holders. Telus apparently sends out about a thousand notices each week, while the Business Software Alliance says it sent out 60,000 notifications to Canadians last year. These numbers are consistent with my own experience […]
RFID Fails To Generate Cost Savings
The Wall Street Journal has a revealing article on Wal-Mart's use of RFID tags. The article notes that the RFID implementation has failed to generate expected cost savings, noting that other RFID projects have faced similar hurdles.
Banks Pull Credit Cards After Security Breach
The Toronto Star reports that three major banks – CIBC, Bank of Nova Scotia, and Bank of Montreal, are replacing thousands of credit cards in the wake of the Winners and Homesense security breach. A source says that some fraudulent purchases have been made using cards hit by the breach.
Federal Court Orders Privacy Commissioner to Investigate Complaint
The Federal Court of Canada yesterday issued an important decision addressing the jurisdictional reach of Canada's privacy legislation. The case involved a complaint launched by Pippa Lawson of CIPPIC against U.S.-based Abika.com over the collection and use of her personal information. The Privacy Commissioner refused to investigate, arguing that Abika.com declined to cooperate with the investigation and that she therefore lacked the jurisdiction to proceed.
CIPPIC applied for judicial review and yesterday won the case. The court gets it exactly right – "with respect, I think the Commissioner did not distinguish her power to investigate from the effectiveness of her investigation."
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