Canadian ISPs Publish Transparency Reports On Government Requests For User Data

In response to a letter from privacy activists, Teksavvy Solutions Inc (Teksavvy), a Canadian Internet Service Provider (ISP), published a 16-page “transparency report” disclosing the numbers and types of government requests for user data and its responses to such requests. Rogers Communications Inc (RCI) later published its own similar but less detailed report. This appears to suggest that Canadian technology companies may be following the lead of US corporations that have published transparency reports to address privacy concerns of users following the Edward Snowden leaks of 2013. The Teksavvy report indicates that it handled 52 government requests in 2012 and 2013, of which 17 were fulfilled and 35 were denied, and all of which were made in response to criminal investigations. The report stated that any non-exigent request made without a warrant or production order would generally be denied unless it was, (i) made pursuant to a lawful authority in the context of a law enforcement investigation; and (ii) restricted to basic subscriber information. The RCI report states that it received approximately 175,000 government requests in 2013 and generally described the types of requests that it received, but it did not disclose the number of requests that were fulfilled. It will be interesting to see what impact there will be on future transparency reports from Bills C-13 and S-4, currently before Parliament. If enacted in their current form, they would give technology companies more latitude to share user data with law enforcement agencies and other companies. Bill C-13, the Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, would allow a company to voluntarily disclose user data to a law enforcement agency. Bill S-4, the Digital Privacy Act, would allow a company to share user data with another company if the information could assist the investigation of a crime or breach of contract. For a link to a related article from The Globe and Mail newspaper, visit: http://tinyurl.com/osa379y Summary by: Darren Hall