Canadian Privacy Commissioner Files Application In Federal Court Against Google

On August 28, 2026, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) announced that it had filed an application with the Federal Court seeking an order to implement its recommendations to Google following an investigation into Google’s privacy practices that concluded on August 27, 2025.

As previously reported by the E-TIPS^® Newsletter here, in June 2017, the OPC received a complaint alleging that Google’s display of articles concerning an individual’s (the Complainant’s) past criminal charges in search results for their name violated Canada’s federal private-sector privacy law, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Given that the charges that were the subject of the media articles were subsequently stayed by the Crown shortly after they were laid, the Complainant argued that the articles were outdated and misleading, and that their appearance in Google search results for their name had caused the Complainant serious harm, including physical assault, lost employment opportunities, and severe social stigma. Accordingly, the Complainant sought to have the media articles de-listed from the Google search results.

In its investigation into the matter, the OPC found that Google’s continued display of the media articles in response to searches for the Complainant’s name complied with PIPEDA’s accuracy requirements. However, in assessing whether a reasonable person would consider the continued display of the articles appropriate in the circumstances, the OPC found that it caused significant harm to the Complainant’s safety and dignity and such harm outweighed the limited public interest in accessing the articles through searching the Complainant’s name.

The OPC concluded that Google had violated PIPEDA and recommended that Google de-list the articles from the results displayed in response to searches for the Complainant’s name. Google declined to implement the Commissioner’s recommendation.

As a result, on August 25, 2026, the OPC filed a Notice of Application with the Federal Court seeking, among other things, an order requiring Google to de-list the search results displayed in response to searches for the Complainant’s name and to correct its practices by implementing clear and specific measures for responding to de-listing requests under PIPEDA.

Summary By: Victoria Di Felice