Big Brother will be watching Plaintiffs and Counselor Trachtenberg!

Tansi/Good Day Folks:

Interesting article. If the Manitoba Metis Federation's frivolous, vexatious, malicious SLAPP suit (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) involving now defunct www.CyberSmokeSignals.com goes to trial, it will create not only precedent setting case law but technology issues the likes of which Courts here have not seen.

While Federation lawyer Murray Trachtenberg was able to get a publication ban, Court of Queen's Bench Justice Karen Simonsen has ruled it only applies to the current round of Pre-Trial Conferences. This case is highly marketable both nationally and internationally. Little did the Plaintiffs and their Counsel realize what they were getting themselves into when they began the process back in mid-September 2003. Technology has sure changed since then hasn't it?

Sincerely,
Clare L. Pieuk
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Ann Cavoukian

Privacy And Technology: Friends Or Foes?
Globe and Mail
January 28, 2009

As the Internet, cellphones and digital cameras become a bigger part of everyday life for Canadians, old issues of privacy in the public sphere are facing new dilemmas.

Google, the online search giant, tracks user habits in order to customize its advertising and refine its search alogithms. Online social networks like Facebook and MySpace often display personal information in a very public way - but offer a new, nuanced method of communication for millions.

Surveillance cameras worry many privacy advocates, but they are incredibly valuable as a law-enforcement tool. Last week's day-time shooting at a Toronto subway station illustrates this point: Within a few hours, a photo of the supected shooter was on the police website, as reported in the Globe's story, Police find trusty partner in CCTV. Globe writer Kirk Makin alludes to this tension between privacy and technology in his Wednesday article, Technology straining paper-era privacy laws.

Ann Cavoukian

On the Web: The 'privacy by design' website

The problem some judges face, he writes, is an obligation to use laws written at a time when communications tended to involve pens, paper, file folders or a single telephone call.

"The courts are really struggling with how to reconcile the realities of technology with our own expectations about what it means to live private lives without the intruding eye of government," says Scott Hutchison, an expert in both privacy and new technology.

How can we expect privacy laws to adapt as technology changes? And what can we ask of corporations in order to ensure privacy and personal information continue to be protected?

Sorting through the legal and ethical implications of new technology can be incredibly complex. That's why we are excited to have Ann Cavoukian, Ontario's Information and Privacy Commissioner, with us Thursday at 1:00 p.m. ET to talk about this complex topic. You can submit a question in advance using our comment tool, and remember to join us then for the live discussion.

Dr. Cavoukian is recognized as one of the leading privacy experts in the world. She was appointed Commissioner in 1997, and is the first to be reappointed for a second term.

An avowed leader in the role that technology can play in protecting privacy, Dr. Cavoukian's leadership has seen her Office develop a number of tools and procedures to ensure that privacy is protected in Ontario — and around the world. "Privacy by Design," a term coined by the Commissioner in the '90s, has now become the primary approach to ensuring privacy in a networked world — by embedding privacy into the design specifications of various technologies, thereby achieving the strongest protections.

Dr. Cavoukian's published works include Who Knows: Safeguarding Your Privacy in a Networked World, written in 1997 with Don Tapscott, and, The Privacy Payoff: How Successful Businesses Build Customer Trust, written in 2002 with Tyler Hamilton.

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