Tag: Law

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Supreme Court decision cheered by online privacy proponents

Supreme Court decision cheered by online privacy proponents:

Supreme Court ruled on Friday that police must seek judicial approval before they can request data about individuals’ internet identities, even in the case of serious crimes.

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“This is an amazing ruling for Canadians who are concerned about privacy,” said Christopher Parsons, a postdoctoral fellow at the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs and a frequent critic of government policy on electronic privacy.

Recent revelations of widespread internet surveillance by police, not just in Canada but across much of the world, have caused alarm among academics and others concerned about lack of information around the extent to which governments snoop on citizens.

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In response to rising public concern, Canada’s telecom sector has for the first time begun disclosing details about the number and type of requests they’ve received. Rogers Communications Inc. and TekSavvy Solutions Inc. recently came forward and others are expected to follow.

The disclosures suggest a close relationship among police and at least some telecoms, where authorities routinely ask for and are given information about individual customers, typically IP addresses and phone numbers, though sometimes also the contents of email conversations.

The Supreme Court ruling means that at the very least, getting access to customer data is going to become a lot more time consuming for the police and as a result “the enormous volume of requests would have to go down,” said Mr. Parsons.

 

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RCMP use of data may spark probe

RCMP use of data may spark probe:

Canada’s privacy watchdog is considering a formal review into the RCMP’s use of Canadians’ personal data gleaned from telecom and Internet companies without a warrant. The potential review comes after the Mounties admitted to Parliament in April that they do not track how often requests are made for “basic subscriber information” from telecom and Internet service providers.

At this point, there is a Supreme Court of Canada case concerning warrantless disclosure of data, a constitutional challenge being mounted against the section of Canadian commercial privacy law authorizing such disclosures, newspaper editorials calling for a Royal Commission on Spying (based, in part, on these warrantless disclosures), along with additional (related) legal, policy, and advocacy efforts to reform contemporary surveillance in Canada. Something in the current regime has to give.

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Federal privacy law faces constitutional challenge

Federal privacy law faces constitutional challenge:

In 2011, the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association said its members received a total of 1.2 million requests in one year, and disclosed information about 780,000 customers.

The civil liberties group acknowledges that law enforcement may need access to some personal information in specific circumstances, but says the current law is “too broad.”

Cara Zwibel, a lawyer with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, said the sheer scale of the disclosures concerns her group and makes it question the legitimacy of the requests.

“We know that there are implications for people when this kind of information gets shared, there’s also a lack of transparency,” she told CBC News in an interview.

Zwibel noted that people have trouble finding out from their telecom provider if government agencies have asked about them, and the government isn’t clear about what it does with the information, including sharing with foreign governments. Meanwhile, some people find themselves on no-fly lists without knowing how or why.

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Police could see tax info without warrant under proposed law

Police could see tax info without warrant under proposed law:

Police would be able to see Canadians’ private tax information without the use of a warrant under a proposed government law. If it’s passed, the Canada Revenue Agency could voluntarily hand over a taxpayer’s data to police and the citizen would never be notified. The change is proposed in the Conservatives’ 375-page omnibus budget bill through a clause that amends the Income Tax Act.

Omnibus legislation: the most efficient way of pushing through massive changes to the structure of Canada’s laws without most people (including experts) fully appreciating the extent to which things are about to change.

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The Canadian Government Is Creeping on Your Facebook

The Canadian Government Is Creeping on Your Facebook:

Christopher Parsons, a cybersurveillance researcher at the Canadian nonprofit Citizen Lab, said the kind of social media surveillance used varied depending on the government agency. Law enforcement might use specialized and automated tools developed to monitor and react to events on social media, while political officials might be checking to see if citizens like new policies.

Parsons agreed that “some federal agencies are likely breaking the Privacy Act, because data is being collected without clear purpose,” he told me in an email. “Canadians don’t lose all their privacy rights just because data is made public and, unfortunately, the government doesn’t seem to realize this nuance of Canadian law. Hopefully they’ll come to their senses soon.“

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Responding the the Crisis in Canadian Telecommunications

This post argues that Canadians are not powerless. They can use existing laws to try and learn whether their communications companies are disclosing their personal information to state agencies. I begin by explaining why Canadians have a legal right to compel companies to disclose the information that they generate and collect about Canadians. I then provide a template letter that Canadians can fill in and issue to the telecommunications companies providing them with service, as well as some of the contact information for major Canadian telecommunications companies. Finally, I’ll provide a few tips on what to do if companies refuse to respond to your requests and conclude by explaining why it’s so important that Canadians send these demands to companies providing them with phone, wireless, and internet service.

It’s not hard to file a request to a telecommunications company and, now, I’ve made it as simple as filling out and mailing a form letter.

Source: Responding the the Crisis in Canadian Telecommunications

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2013.11.11

Generally it takes an incident to focus attention on the issue of informational privacy – and such incidents tend to focus on one type of record system at a time. This human interest element helps to define the policy problem, galvanize media and public attention, and give members of Congress concrete examples of privacy invasion to justify their votes. There is always vocal and well-financed opposition to privacy protections, generally from business and government bureaucrats who do not want to restrict access to information. Their opposition is usually quite successful in weakening the proposed privacy protections and in further narrowing the scope of such protections. And after passage opponents are likely the challenge legislation in the courts, often on the basis of First Amendment grounds that any information, including that about individuals, should flow freely and without government restrictions.

Priscilla M. Regan (2008), “The United States,” in Global Privacy Protection: The First Generation, James B. Rule and Graham Greenlead (eds.).
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‘Betray’ the NSA at Your Own Peril

It’s important to not resist the NSA when it wants something, especially if you depend on them for key contracts. From the Washington Post:

Nacchio was convicted of selling of Qwest stock in early 2001, not long before the company hit financial troubles. However, he claimed in court documents that he was optimistic about the firm’s ability to win classified government contracts — something they’d succeeded at in the past. And according to his timeline, in February 2001 — some six months before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks — he was approached by the NSA and asked to spy on customers during a meeting he thought was about a different contract. He reportedly refused because his lawyers believed such an action would be illegal and the NSA wouldn’t go through the FISA Court. And then, he says, unrelated government contracts started to disappear.

His narrative matches with the warrantless surveillance program reported by USA Today in 2006 which noted Qwest as the lone holdout from the program, hounded by the agency with hints that their refusal “might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government.” But Nacchio was prevented from bringing up any of this defense during his jury trial — the evidence needed to support it was deemed classified and the judge in his case refused his requests to use it. And he still believes his prosecution was retaliatory for refusing the NSA requests for bulk access to customers’ phone records. Some other observers share that opinion, and it seems consistent with evidence that has been made public, including some of the redacted court filings unsealed after his conviction.

Not only was Nacchio charged, but he was unable to mount a full defence in a public court on the basis that part of that defence depended on revealing classified information. That information, itself, concerned the CEO’s unwillingness to engage in what his counsel advised were illegal activities.

You don’t need secret courts to undermine the course of justice, or secret investigations. All you really need to do is establish that some evidence is too secret to be used in your defence. In effect, by precluding a full-throated defence of the accused the very legitimacy of the open court system is undermined.

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On the Zimmerman verdict …

politicalprof:

So let me see if I have this straight:

In Florida, I can follow an otherwise law-abiding person around on a dark and rainy night, and if they decide I am a threat and respond, I get to shoot and kill them if I start losing the fight.

I am sure the people of Florida are sleeping much more secure in their beds knowing that this could never happen to their child or in their neighborhood.

Quality work all around.

Legalizing lethal stalking: a really great decision…

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How to Fight Revenge Porn

Via The Atlantic:

For those whose privately shared photos have made their way to the web, an argument of implied confidentiality may be a good bet.

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We should have a better national dialogue about a romantic partner’s obligations of confidentiality. Salient norms of confidentiality would strengthen our relationships as well as the legal remedies for those whose trust has been betrayed. Notably, confidentiality law is not as problematic under the First Amendment as legislation or other tort remedies. Instead of prohibiting a certain kind of speech, confidentially law enforces express or implied promises and shared expectations. The tort of breach of confidentiality is currently very limited in scope, but could be made much more robust to sit alongside the more commonly asserted privacy torts. Under an “inducement to breach confidentiality” theory, it is even possible that certain websites would not be able to take full advantage of the immunity typically provided by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

This is an interesting approach, and one that might undermine some of the protections used to shield truly abhorrent websites.