In Rankin c. Rankin, 2014 QCCQ 8981, which came out a few days ago, a plaintiff was awarded $10,000 in compensatory damages and $3,000 in punitive damages, after defamatory comments were made about him on Facebook and in public in the context of an election campaign. The plaintiff and the defendant are cousins and both members of the Algonquin community Abitibiwinni. Several […] Read more
For those who, like me, found Law Professor Ryan Calo‘s “Digital Market Manipulation” article absolutely interesting and fascinating, will be delighted to know that there is a new publication on this topic. Law Professor David C. Vladeck just published a piece entitled: “Digital Marketing, Consumer Protection, and the First Amendment: A Brief Reply to Professor Ryan Calo“. […] Read more
The Eighteenth Annual Canadian IT Law Association Conference is taking place in Montreal, on October 20 and 21st 2014. I will be moderating a panel on Cybersecurity: Mitigating Business Risk on the 20th, 4:00 to 5:30pm. Speakers on the panel include Russell Cohen, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP (San Francisco), Dr. Avner Levin, Director, Privacy & Cybercrime […] Read more
There was an article today about a Canadian woman judge who stands to lose her job because her husband shared naked photos of her online without her knowledge or permission. A complaint against her argued that the photos could be seen as inherently contrary to the image and concept of integrity of the judiciary… Sexually explicit […] Read more
The Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) has recently ruled on the issue of “credit charges” pursuant to the Consumer Protection Act and the issuance of punitive damages in Bank of Montreal v. Marcotte, as well as the two companion cases, Marcotte v. Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec, and Amex Bank of Canada v. Adams. In […] Read more
Last spring I was invited to testify and present with Dr. Avner Levin before the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, House of Commons, in the context of their study conducted on the “Growing Problem of Identity Theft and its Economic Impact“. I discussed why there are no real incentives for Canadian businesses to […] Read more
I came across an article today about Toronto police officers which will soon begin to wear body cameras as part of a pilot project in December. This project is launched in response to the growing number of accusations of citizens claiming that police officers use excessive force or acted inappropriately with them. Given that citizens […] Read more
A recent article reports that Facebook is considering its first steps into the field of health care: it is exploring creating online support communities that would connect Facebook users suffering from various diseases or chronic ailments. Facebook would also be exploring new “preventative care” apps that would help users improve their lifestyles. Interesting benefits One one hand, without any doubt, there could […] Read more
In response to concerns about widespread Internet surveillance by police and law enforcement agencies, many Canadian telcos have been releasing their transparency reports for 2013. Rogers released its report earlier this year and Telus issued its 2013 transparency report a few weeks ago. It is now for SaskTel to release its transparency report. The SaskTel report confirms that in 2013, SaskTel […] Read more
Last summer, it was revealed that Facebook had manipulated its users’ feeds to run a psychological experiment. A report titled “Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks” was published, which disclosed that in 2012, Facebook manipulated the news feeds of 689,003 users to see if the emotion they picked up through the content on […] Read more