BC Privacy Commissioner finds city's use of public surveillance cameras unlawful ... off to court

The Information and PrivacyCommissioner of British Columbia just found that the City of Richmond in the BC lower mainland broke the law when it installed ultra-high-definition cameras in public places that capture faces, licence plates, and other identifiers. The Commissioner recommended that they take down the cameras and delete all the recordings. The City said “nope”, so the Commissioner issued a binding order for them to stop collection, delete recordings, and disband the system.

This is definitely going to court. The City of Richmond issued a statement saying they think it is lawful and appropriate, and are looking to have the legality of all of this determined by the Courts. I think that’s a good thing … the more clarity we have from the superior courts on the interpretation of our privacy laws, the better.

I should note that while these laws are generally consistent from province to province, there is a big variation on how police services are delivered. Not all of the conclusions of this finding will necessarily be applicable in all other provinces or municipalities.

The City of Richmond in British Columbia began field testing its “Public Safety Camera System” – or PSCS – in early 2025 at the intersection of Minoru Boulevard and Granville Avenue.

The City’s stated sole purpose was to collect and disclose video footage to the RCMP to assist in identifying criminal suspects. That point—sole purpose—is central to the Commissioner’s analysis. There was no other rationale for the City of Richmond to put up these cameras in these locations. 

Operationally, the system involved multiple high-resolution cameras capturing:

• licence plate numbers,
• high-definition images of vehicle occupants,
• pedestrians,
• vehicle identifying features, and
• location/time information tied to the intersection.

The cameras recorded continuously, and the City retained footage for 48 hours before deletion.

The field test included capabilities like licence plate recognition, pan-tilt-zoom variants, panoramic/multi-sensor configurations, and other detection features; the City confirmed it did not use facial recognition or built-in audio recording during field testing, though some cameras had those capabilities.

The City’s goal for the field test was essentially procurement-and-design: evaluate camera tech, decide numbers and placement, assess performance in different conditions, and confirm the PSCS could generate “usable” footage for law enforcement use later.

Under BC FIPPA, public bodies can’t collect personal information just because it seems useful. Collection has to fit within a listed authorization—most importantly here, s. 26.

The Commissioner situates that within a broader privacy-protective approach: privacy rights are treated as quasi-constitutional, and public bodies should only compromise privacy where there’s a compelling state interest.

Richmond relied on three possible authorities:

• s. 26(b) (law enforcement),
• s. 26(c) (authorized program/activity + necessity),
• s. 26(e) (planning/evaluating a program/activity).

The Commissioner rejected all three, finding there simply was not legal authority for the collection of personal information – and without legal authority, there’s no lawful collection.

Richmond first said they were authorized under s. 26(b):

26          A public body may collect personal information only if

(b)          the information is collected for the purposes of law enforcement,

Note the use of the word “only”. Unless section 26 permits it, a public body cannot collect personal information.

Richmond’s theory was straightforward: the definition of “law enforcement” includes policing, and the PSCS was meant to support policing by helping identify suspects—so it’s “for law enforcement.” That was their alleged purpose.

The Commissioner accepted there’s a connection: the information might be used by the RCMP in policing. But the Commissioner says that’s not the end of the inquiry, because the collector is the City—and the City must have a law enforcement mandate of its own to rely on s. 26(b).

This is a recurring theme in Canadian privacy oversight: a public body can’t bootstrap a law-enforcement collection power merely because another entity with a law-enforcement mandate might find the data useful.

The City may pay for law enforcement, and it may provide resources to law enforcement but they do not have a lawful law enforcement mandate. 

The report describes three arguments Richmond advanced:

1. RCMP mandate should be imputed to the City (because the City “provides” policing by contracting with the RCMP to do it).
2. The City has a mandate to collect information for the RCMP.
3. The City has its own independent mandate to police through the cameras.

The Commissioner’s response is pretty technical: under the Police Act and the Municipal Police Unit Agreement framework, municipalities fund and resource policing, but policing authority and law enforcement functions remain with the police, operating independently of the municipality.

He underscores that the Police Act sets out specific ways a municipality provides policing—such as establishing a municipal force or contracting with the RCMP—and “running a surveillance camera system for the police to use” is not among those statutory options.

He also points to the RCMP’s peace-officer functions and the Municipal Police Unit Agreement structure as vesting law enforcement responsibilities in the RCMP, not the City, and he reads the legislative set-up as intentionally keeping policing independent from municipal control.

So this argument advanced by the City failed: the City lacked the necessary law-enforcement mandate, so it could not collect under s. 26(b)—even if the police might later use the footage.

Section 26(c) is the classic “public body operational authority” provision: even if a statute doesn’t explicitly say “collect this kind of personal information,” a public body can collect personal information if it is both:

• directly related to an authorized program or activity, and
• necessary for that program or activity.

Richmond framed its program as essentially: an intersection camera program to identify criminal suspects following criminal incidents, pointing to broad service powers under its Community Charter.

But the Commissioner rejected that program characterization as “authorized,” because—again—of the Police Act structure. In the Commissioner’s view, “collecting evidence to identify criminals that the RCMP may rely on” isn’t part of how the City is authorized to provide policing services or resources under the Police Act framework.

So, the analysis fails at the first step: if the underlying “program” isn’t authorized, 26(c) can’t save the collection.

The report goes further and addresses necessity. The Commissioner emphasizes that the City’s record was limited in establishing that: (a) unresolved crime was “real, substantial, and pressing,” (b) existing measures were ineffective, or (c) less intrusive means had been seriously examined.

He characterizes the intrusion into privacy as “vast,” relative to the limited evidentiary foundation offered to justify necessity.

The net effect was that the Commissioner was not satisfied that the City demonstrated that mass capture of high-definition identifying footage from “tens of thousands of people each day” who had nothing to do with any sort of crime was necessary for the purported municipal activity.

Richmond also argued: the field test is just planning and evaluation, and s. 26(e) specifically authorizes collection necessary for planning/evaluating a program.

The Commissioner’s treatment of 26(e) is crisp: 26(e) presupposes that the program being planned or evaluated is otherwise authorized. You can plan or evalue an authorized program, but if the program ain’t authorized, you can’t collect personal information to plan or evaluate it. Richmond itself largely accepted that proposition, and the Commissioner agreed.

Because the Commissioner had already found the PSCS was not authorized under 26(b) or 26(c), Richmond could not rely on 26(e) to do “planning” for an unauthorized program.

It makes sense that you can’t use the planning/evaluation clause as an end-run around the core requirement of lawful authority. Otherwise, everything under the sun could be said to be for planning or evaluation. 

FIPPA generally requires notice of purpose and authority when collecting personal information. Richmond tried to avoid notice by invoking s. 27(3)(a)—the idea that a notice is not required where the information is “about law enforcement.”

The Commissioner gives two responses.

First: the City couldn’t rely on law enforcement as its underlying authorization in the first place—so that alone undermined the attempt to rely on the exception.

Second, and more fact-specific: during the field testing phase, the City had confirmed it was not using the information for actual public safety or enforcement purposes—only to test and evaluate camera technical capabilities.

So even reading “about law enforcement” broadly, the Commissioner questioned whether the testing-phase collection qualified as “about law enforcement,” because it would not be used to enforce any laws, and there was no compelling enforcement purpose weighing against notice.

Richmond did install signs, but the Commissioner describes them as a “courtesy” and finds them legally inadequate.

The sign said “PUBLIC SAFETY CAMERA TESTING / FIELD TESTING IN PROGRESS AT THIS INTERSECTION” with contact information for the City’s Director of Transportation.

The Commissioner’s critique is twofold:

1. First there was a Content deficiency: the signs did not clearly notify people that cameras were recording and collecting personal information, and did not include the purposes and legal authority for collection as required by s. 27(2).
2. And secondly there was a Placement deficiency: signage was vehicle-focused, placed for eastbound and westbound approaches, but did not address entries from other directions and did not notify pedestrians—despite the system’s capacity to capture pedestrians and pan widely, including multi-direction recording.

The Commissioner’s conclusion is direct: the City did not adequately notify individuals when it collected their personal information during field testing.

The report notes that disclosure under s. 33(2) generally depends on lawful collection in the first place, and because the collection lacked authority, the City could not rely on “consistent purpose” disclosure to the RCMP for evaluation.

On security, the Commissioner acknowledges the City described a reasonably robust set of safeguards, and that even where collection is unlawful, the City still has a duty under s. 30 to protect personal information in its custody or control.

But safeguards don’t cure lack of authority. They are necessary, not sufficient.

The OIPC’s recommendations were blunt:

1. stop collecting personal information through the PSCS,
2. delete all recordings, and
3. disband the equipment.

Richmond advised it would not comply, and the Commissioner issued Order F26-01, requiring immediate compliance and written evidence of compliance by a specific date.

My takeaway is that the Commissioner’s reasoning is primarily structural and jurisdictional: the City tried to create a surveillance-for-police capability, but the Commissioner reads BC’s legal framework as drawing a hard line between municipal services and police law-enforcement authority—particularly when the activity is mass surveillance in public space.

If you’re a public body contemplating “pilot projects” with high-capability cameras, the report is a reminder that planning provisions don’t let you pilot an unauthorized program, and that “law enforcement adjacent” doesn’t equal “law enforcement authorized.”

For a public body, every collection of personal information has to be directly authorized by law. It’s worth noting that the “law enforcement” provision in most public sector privacy laws is wide enough to drive a truck through. The RCMP in Richmond could have paid for and put up those cameras all over the place, since they have a law enforcement mandate. 

Criminal courts are pretty adept at dealing with privacy invasions on a case-by-case basis using section 8 of the Charter, but we actually need a better way to to evaluate proportionality, necessity and appropriateness when it comes to proposed police programs that hoover up data on hundreds, thousands or maybe millions of innocent people in the name of “law enforcement”.

It’ll be interesting to see how the courts deal with this.

 

Video: Home surveillance cameras

In my legal practice, I exclusively advise businesses on matters related to privacy and technology law. But I am sometimes asked by individuals about the use of home surveillance cameras. Because of advances in technology and low cost, they’re everywhere. The rise of home delivery has led to porch pirates who steal packages, and people want to deter that or to try to catch porch pirates in the act.

If you keep an eye out walking down a suburban street, you’ll often see them. Doorbell cameras are very popular, but so are other cameras.

The purpose of this discussion is to review the laws that do and do not apply to individuals who use these devices on their own private property. At least in this discussion, I’m not going to talk about the laws as they may apply to companies that provide these services used by individuals.

Different rules

Many people are familiar with privacy regulations like the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act or the provincial Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Acts.

Businesses are regulated by commercial privacy laws, whether federal or provincial.

Government and police are regulated by public sector privacy laws.

But the personal and “domestic” collection of personal information is unregulated in Canada.

General privacy regulations do not apply

Commercial privacy regulations do not apply to private individuals collecting, using or disclosing personal information for their own personal purposes.

For example, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, known as PIPEDA, only applies to the collection, use and disclosure of personal information in the course of commercial activity.

And just to be more clear, paragraph 4(2)(b) of that Act excludes personal or domestic purposes:

It says This Part does not apply to …

(b) any individual in respect of personal information that the individual collects, uses or discloses for personal or domestic purposes and does not collect, use or disclose for any other purpose;

If you are collecting personal information – which includes video and images that include a person – only for personal or domestic purposes, that is excluded from the Act.

The Personal Information Acts of British Columbia and Alberta are very similar.

For example, paragraph 3(2)(a) has an exclusion that is very similar to PIPEDA’s.

“This Act does not apply to the following: (a) the collection, use or disclosure of personal information, if the collection, use or disclosure is for the personal or domestic purposes of the individual who is collecting, using or disclosing the personal information and for no other purpose;”

Other “Privacy” laws

Just because this activity is not captured by our general privacy laws, other laws may apply.

Our Criminal Code includes offences for voyeurism and the interception of private communications.

Voyeurism

The crime of voyeurism was added to the Criminal Code relatively recently.

It involves surreptitiously observing or recording a person where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Paragraph (a) makes it an offence to observe or record in a place in which a person can reasonably be expected to be nude … or to be engaged in explicit sexual activity.

Paragraph (b) makes it an offence where the recording or observing is done for the purpose of observing or recording a person in such a state or engaged in such an activity.

Paragraph (c) covers a broader range of observation or recording, but where it is done for a sexual purpose.

People should be aware that the courts have held you can have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a relatively public place and that the expectation of privacy can vary according to the method of observation. For example, you may not have much of an expectation of privacy with regard to being observed by someone at eye level, but you may have a protected expectation of privacy from being observed or recorded up a person’s dress or from above to look down their top.

Don’t point a camera where someone has a reasonable expectation of privacy.

This would include pointing at a neighbour’s windows, fenced back yards, pool, hot tub, etc.

Interception of private communications

Audio recording is particularly hazardous in Canada.

Using a device to knowingly intercept a private communication can be a very serious offence in Canada.

If your camera can record audio, don’t put it where it might record a private communication or disable that feature. And be careful.

You may have a camera on your fence-post that is exclusively pointed at your property, but it may capture private conversations among your neighbours on the other side of the fence.

Consent is a defence to a charge under this section, but it’s unclear if signage can create adequate consent.

Other privacy laws

In addition to the criminal law, people should also be mindful of the laws where you can be sued.

This includes the law of nuisance, the law of trespass, and privacy claims under “intrusion upon seclusion” and some provincial privacy statutes.

Nuisance

Nuisance is a very old, and well established legal claim. It boils down to “unreasonable interference with the ordinary enjoyment of property.”

A lot of traditional, old nuisance claims relate to noises, bad smells, smoke and things like that, but we are starting to see cases where people claim that someone’s use of surveillance cameras is interfering with their enjoyment of their own property.

The case of Suzuki and Monroe from the British Columbia Supreme Court in 2009 is instructive.

In this case, the Suzukis sued the Monroes for having a loud air conditioner and for having a surveillance camera that included part of the Suzuki property. In finding in favour of the plaintiffs, the judge wrote:

“I have no doubt that a surveillance camera continuously observing the entrance areas to a neighbouring property, or any part thereof, in these circumstances, is an intolerable interference with the use and enjoyment of the neighbouring property…

No useful purpose of any kind is served by having the camera directed at any part of the Suzuki property.

I am forced to conclude that the Munroes installed the camera and refused to remove or redirect it at least in part in order to provoke and annoy the Suzukis.

Acts done with the intention of annoying a neighbour and actually causing annoyance will be a nuisance, although the same amount of annoyance would not be a nuisance if done in the ordinary and reasonable use of the property….”

It is important to note that the judge said the use of cameras was not really necessary for any legitimate purposes of the defendants. If it had been legit, it might not have been found to be a nuisance.

We’ll talk about another, similar BC case in a bit.

Trespassing

Trespassing is unlawful. It can be a criminal offence, a provincial offence or someting you can sue someone for.

Don’t enter a neigbhour’s property to install or locate a camera without their permission. Putting a camera physically on a property that is not yours without permission is also unlawful.

Intrusion upon seclusion

In addition to the more traditional torts that I just mentioned, we are seeing more pure privacy claims.

In most common law provinces, you can sue or be sued for “intrusion upon seclusion”.

It is, in summary “an intentional or reckless intrusion, without lawful justification, into the plaintiff's private affairs or concerns that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person.”

If you poke into someone’s private life in a way that would be highly offensive, harm and damages are presumed.

Statutory torts

Some provinces have what are called statutory torts of invasion of privacy.

Here is the gist of the British Columbia Privacy Act.

1(1) It is a tort, actionable without proof of damage, for a person, wilfully and without a claim of right, to violate the privacy of another.

This means that the plaintiff doesn’t have to prove they were actually harmed. That is presumed.

Note the violation has to be without a claim of right or legitimate justification.

It then goes on and says …

(2) The nature and degree of privacy to which a person is entitled in a situation or in relation to a matter is that which is reasonable in the circumstances, giving due regard to the lawful interests of others.

(3) In determining whether the act or conduct of a person is a violation of another's privacy, regard must be given to the nature, incidence and occasion of the act or conduct and to any domestic or other relationship between the parties.

Note it specifically refers to eavesdropping and surveillance in subsection (4), which reads:

(4) Without limiting subsections (1) to (3), privacy may be violated by eavesdropping or surveillance, whether or not accomplished by trespass.

For the use of home surveillance cameras to protect your private property, paragraph 2(2)(b) is important:

2(2) An act or conduct is not a violation of privacy if any of the following applies:

(b) the act or conduct was incidental to the exercise of a lawful right of defence of person or property; …

Let’s see how that plays out in practice.

This specifically came up in another British Columbia case called Minicucci and Liu, a 2021 decision from the British Columbia Supreme Court.

This was another dispute between neighbours.

For backyard privacy, the plaintiff planted eight 25-foot cedars and twenty 10-foot cedars along the property line. This is the property line between the parties’ homes. The plaintiffs had a pool in their backyard, and the defendants had one as well.

Sometime later, the defendants asked the plaintiffs to “top” the trees because they were interfering with the defendants’ view. The plaintiffs refused.

Sometime later, while the plaintiff was away from their home, the defendant topped numerous of the cedar trees.

The plaintiff installed cameras pointed at the trees, and the camera also could see into the defendant’s backyard.

So the plaintiff sued the defendants seeking damages and injunctive relief for trespass and damage to the cedar trees.

The defendants filed a counterclaim seeking damages from the plaintiff for nuisance and for invasion of privacy by the camera.

The defendant’s privacy claim was dismissed because the use and location of the cameras was justified. Capturing a portion of the defendant’s backyard was incidental and the camera had been installed because of the defendant’s trespass and topping their trees.

The court also noted that it would not have been possible to record the trees without incidentally including some of the backyard.

Other rules - Condo rules

In some cases, there may be other rules that affect whether or how someone can install surveillance cameras.

In a 2022 Alberta court case called Lupuliak and Condo Plan 82111689, the Court of Queen’s bench found against a condo owner because the installation of a doorbell camera on the person’s door violated the condo rules. A similar camera that had been installed on the person’s patio was found not to be an issue.

Other rules - Leases

If you’re a tenant, you would want to check your lease or check with your landlord before installing any device outside your leased space. This would also include your door.

Purely public places

Many cameras that people install to observe their front doors or driveways will also include coverage of public spaces like sidewalks and roads.

There’s a diminished expectation of privacy in a completely public space like a road or a sidewalk.

However, expectation of privacy is not binary but is more nuanced.

If it came up, the courts will likely do a balancing test: is your legitimate need to use the device proportionate to the intrusion for others?

What if police ask for your footage?

Since most people use home surveillance cameras to deter or detect criminal activity, it’s worth asking what to do if the police ask for your footage.

With the increasing adoption of the devices, police are more commonly doing a video or CCTV canvas as part of their investigations. This involves going around the area to see if there are any cameras that may have captured something that can further their investigation.

So if the police come knocking looking for footage from your camera, what should you do?

Unlike businesses that are subject to general privacy regulations, you can give them footage without a warrant or a court order. That doesn’t mean you have to. It’s entirely up to you, unless they have something called a production order, which requires you to provide it.

Personally, I would ask them what they’re investigating and I’d decide whether to hand it over on that basis.

And if you are dealing with the police to report a crime and your cameras captured anything relevant, you can feel free to hand it over.

Best practices

So at the end of the day, what are the best practices?

In short, don’t be an idiot.

Be a good neighbour and minimise any recording of anything that is not your own property.

Let people – residents and visitors – know what’s going on. Talk to your neighbours and put up signs. Your neighbour may actually appreciate that you have cameras.

Certainly, don’t point it at any place you’d expect people to be nude or doing “things”

Think about what you’re actually using the cameras for and adjust your settings accordingly. If you are concerned about prowlers at night or someone on your property when you’re not at home, some of these more advanced cameras can be set to only record at night or when you’re not at home.

Takeaways

Remember that though an individual in their private capacity is outside the usual privacy regulations, other laws and rules can still apply.

Respect your neighbours and their privacy interests

Presentation: Little Brother - Surveillance Technology and Privacy Law

I had the pleasure of speaking at the University of New Brunswick Law School's weekly speaker hour, on the topic of non-police use of surveillance technology and how that intersects/collides with Canadian privacy laws. Here are the slides in case it's of wider interest ...

Presentation: Surveillance tech and privacy laws

I was honoured to be asked to give a breakfast presentation to the Canadian Security Association Atlantic Chapter on surveillance and security technology and the law. In case it's of broader interest, here's the presentation:

You can also grab it as a PDF here.

A look at video surveillance in Halifax

The Sunday Chronicle Herald has two articles on the increasing use of video surveillance by police and private organizations in Halifax. They are interesting reading, but what I find most interesting is that this is the first time that I've seen any dicussion of how the police manage the feeds and access to recordings. Check them out:

• Eyes in the sky - Nova Scotia News - TheChronicleHerald.ca
• Wireless cameras add to police toolbox - Nova Scotia News - TheChronicleHerald.ca

  The cameras in place now are not monitored all day long, although they are recording, Supt. Moore said. The images are automatically deleted if there’s no request to see them within 14 days.

  The department used guidelines from the province’s Freedom of Information office as well as the federal Office of the Privacy Commissioner to develop its guidelines for using the images, he said.

  All viewing requests are made to him and only he and his technical staff have access to the recordings.

  "They’re very much locked down and once they’re collected, there’s a formalized process for someone looking to go in and find these images," he said.

  Supt. Moore said police haven’t used video from those downtown cameras to solve "big" crimes – yet.

  "We are still optimistic that it will, but to date it has not been pivotal," he said.

Any discussion of the policies regulating the use of video surveillance is a good thing, and better late than never.

Halifax police plan to use covert cameras in public places

Halifax Police plan to augment their network of surveillance cameras with hidden cameras in public places. Law abiding citizens have nothing to fear, according to the Mayor. Besides, the Mayor says, people are used to being surveilled on private property. What he doesn't seem to get is that private property is "private" property that you enter on the terms set out by the property owner. Public places do not have those stipuations. Or at least they shouldn't.

From the Halifax Chronicle Herald:

Police plan more camera surveillance - Nova Scotia News - TheChronicleHerald.ca

Halifax police intend to step up camera surveillance in public places, the city’s police chief said Tuesday.

Chief Frank Beazley said Halifax Regional Police officers will be using portable digital equipment in the near future to record images at "hot spots" in the municipality and public gatherings like rock concerts.

He told a city hall budget meeting the new gear won’t need to be installed — the police department already has fixed cameras at several locations — because police personnel will simply arrive at a potential trouble spot with cameras and leave with the pictures they’ve collected.

Mayor Peter Kelly supports more secret camera use at different sites. He said cameras tracking public goings-on are already a fact of life here and in other cities.

Asked if extra police snooping is an invasion of privacy, Mr. Kelly said law-abiding citizens have nothing to fear.

"For those who cause concern for others, you’ll have things to worry about," the mayor said, adding, additional surreptitious camera work will hopefully lead to crime prevention and the arrests of lawbreakers.

Mr. Kelly said people are routinely photographed on private property, such as banks, stores, parking lots and elsewhere, and the police plan to beef up surveillance at common areas used by many people makes sense.

Chief Beazley acknowledged the enhanced camera gear will be used at various locations throughout the city.

"If we have a hot spot — there’s crime going on in certain areas — we’re going to be able to take these mobile cameras and surreptitiously (use) them" without the knowledge of those being photographed, he told regional council’s committee of the whole.

Metro has seen a month of violent crime, including three murders. The most recent shootings in the city occurred Friday night and Saturday afternoon. Nobody was killed in either attack.

Saturday’s shooting took place at a house in a residential neighbourhood in Fall River, prompting RCMP to say police are concerned an innocent bystander could get hurt, or worse.

Next generation in CCTV

The New York Times has an interesting piece on developments in CCTV technology. The Digital Window D7 uses a number of compact cameras to piece together a full 180 degree panorama without any distortion. This means that a small camera installation can have a very wide field of view, capturing more than you might think. See "On the Lookout, With a Digital Security Camera".

The Canadian Privacy Law Blog is Five!

Five years ago, on January 2, 2004, a new age of privacy was creeping across Canada and this blog was born. The day before, at the stroke of midnight, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (Canada) had come fully into force. The Alberta and British Columbia Personal Information Protection Acts also became effective on the first day of 2004.

Since then, we have seen dramatic changes in privacy throughout the world: Identity theft is on the rise; there have been literally thousands of data breaches exposing the personal information of millions of people; governments are looking for easier access to personal information; video surveillance is more widespread; more personal information is generated digitally and aggregated in private hands.

And in the past year specifically, things have remained interesting on the privacy front. We've seen debate over changes to PIPEDA without anything definitive coming from the mandatory five year review. We've also seen arguments put forward to reform the public sector Privacy Act. Focus has also been drawn to the increasing practice of examining laptops at US border crossings. Litigation between Viacom and Google has raised awareness of log information that's often retained by internet companies. And Google has also been sued by a couple claiming their privacy has been violated by presenting pictures of their house in Google Street View. But in the last year, the one big privacy story that was supposed to have the largest impact on Canadians was the implementation of the National Do Not Call List. Whether it has, in fact, had an impact is the subject of debate.

I'd like to thank the many thousands of readers of the blog for visiting this site and thanks to those who have contacted me with comments, compliments, suggestions and links to interesting news. It's been a pleasure to write and I plan to keep it going as long as there's interesting privacy news to report.

Birthday cake graphic used under a creative commons license from K. Pierce.

Toronto police relocate cameras

The good news: Toronto police are removing the CCTV cameras that have kept an eye on people at Queen Street West and Bathurst.

The bad news: Apparenly they're just being moved. Where to? I do not know.

See: Torontoist: Smile! You're Not on the Police Camera, via the eagle-eyed, ever-vigilant, but never intrusive Rob Hyndman.

CCTV walk in Halifax

This past Saturday I found myself with an hour to kill downtown. I had my camera with me and my GPS-equipped blackberry, so I decided to do a quick inventory of surveillance cameras. I only took photos of cameras that are in public spaces or were pointed at public spaces.

You can check out the Flickr set or the map.

OPCC begins consultation on covert surveillance guidance

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada is seeking comments on a draft guidance document on covert surveillance. If you have something to say, you have until November 14, 2008:

Consultation on Covert Video Surveillance Draft Guidance Document (October 2008)

The Privacy Commissioner of Canada has prepared a draft guidance document that sets out good practice rules for private sector organizations that are either contemplating or using covert video surveillance.

Through our experience in investigating complaints about covert video surveillance under the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), we have identified a need to educate organizations on the obligation to ensure that covert video surveillance is conducted in the most privacy sensitive way possible. Although the use of covert video surveillance may be appropriate in some circumstances, we view the technology as being inherently intrusive.

We welcome feedback on the draft guidance below. In particular, we seek the comments of those directly affected by covert video surveillance, including unions representing employees of federally regulated organizations as well as consumer associations.

Thank you for your time and attention and we look forward to your comments.

Elizabeth Denham, Assistant Privacy Commissioner

Over-the-top (or under-the-foliage) surveillance leads to backlash in the UK

The ridiculous degree of surveillance in the UK, supported by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, is finally leading to a significant backlash as surveillance powers are being used to catch people who don't scoop their poop. Thanks to Rob Hyndman for the link.

Orwellian U.K. Angers People With Tree Cameras, Snooping Kids

By Caroline Alexander and Howard Mustoe

Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Hidden in foliage next to a path in the southeast England seaside town of Hastings are digital cameras. Their target: litterbugs and dog walkers.

The electronic eyes feed images to a monitoring unit, where they're scanned and stored as evidence to prosecute people who discard garbage or fail to clean up after pets, a spokeswoman for the town council said.

``It's becoming a bit Big Brother-like,'' said Sandra Roberts, 50, a Hastings kiosk manager, invoking George Orwell's 1949 book ``Nineteen Eighty-Four,'' about a Britain where authorities pry into all aspects of citizens' lives.

Local authorities are adopting phone-record logging, e-mail taps and camera surveillance to police such offenses as welfare fraud, unlawful dumping of waste and sick-day fakery. Telecommunications companies are about to join the list of crime monitors. Already, 4.5 million closed-circuit cameras watch public places across Britain, or about 1 camera for every 15 people, the highest ratio in the world.

``There's too much of it now, all this spying,'' said Ivor Quittention, 80, a retired owner of three hardware stores who lives in Hastings. The town's spokeswoman, who declined to be identified, said spying is the most effective way of dealing with something residents complain about most.

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, dubbed ``the snoopers charter'' by London-based civil-rights group Liberty, was passed by the ruling Labour Party in 2000 to legislate methods of surveillance and information gathering. The purpose of the law, known also as Ripa, was to help prevent crime, including terrorism, according to the Home Office.

`Too Much Power'

Initially, only security and intelligence services could invoke the Act's provisions. In 2003, Parliament extended powers to the 474 local councils in England, Scotland and Wales, as well as to 318 other state bodies, including 11 Royal Parks, the Post Office and Chief Inspector of Schools.

Since then, local authorities have been expanding their use of the provisions to dozens of lesser offenses.

The law has loopholes and councils like Hastings aren't doing anything wrong when they invoke it for minor crimes, according to Gus Hosein, a professor from the London School of Economics specializing in technology and privacy.

``Ripa just gives too much power to any Tom, Dick or Harry related to government,'' he said.

The latest proposed expansion of the Act requires telecommunications providers to store the text of all e-mails and details of all phone calls transmitted over their lines.

The government is seeking the views of the public on the proposal until Oct. 31. The bill will then go to Parliament for consideration.

`Sleep-Walking'

Of the 163 U.K. councils that replied to calls and Freedom of Information requests from Bloomberg, 95 percent said they use Ripa. Nine said they don't, including Barnet, Basingstoke and Deane, Broadland, Halton, Harrogate, Shepway, West Devon, Slough and the Shetlands, a group of islands off Scotland where sheep outnumber people. Three declined to provide details without payment of an administrative fee.

East Hampshire, in south England, applied the law to catch vandals defacing tombstones. Derby, in northern England, invoked it to send children with recording gear into shops to see if they'd unlawfully be sold cigarettes and alcohol.

``It's unreal,'' said Dean Price, 24, a graphic designer in London. ``We've been sleep-walking into this. Everyone talks about Orwell and 1984 but no one ever does anything about it.''

A spokesman for the Home Office, which oversees Ripa, said the extension is vital to intelligence gathering and will help investigators identify suspects, track them and examine their contacts. He declined to be identified, in line with policy.

Petty Offenses

The Association of Local Government, which represents councils, said through a statement by outgoing Chairman Simon Milton that the ``crime-busting powers'' are an essential tool in gathering evidence needed to stop criminal activity.

At the same time, Milton said he wrote to all councils in June asking them not to invoke the law for petty offenses.

``It's ironic that a nation that was once a bastion of privacy, one in which `an Englishman's home is his castle' and that did away with National ID Cards in 1952, is now one of the most surveilled in the world,'' said Toby Stevens, founder of London's Enterprise Privacy Group.

The opposition Conservative Party is against Ripa in its current form and will amend it if it wins the next election, due by 2010, home affairs spokesman Dominic Grieve said.

Mark Jewell, a councilman for the U.K.'s third party, the Liberal Democrats, said more checks and balances are needed to ensure Ripa isn't abused. ``At the moment, you don't need to have done anything wrong to get snooped on,'' he said. No other European Union government has similar regulations.

`Hugely Disproportionate'

Among councils which responded to Bloomberg's questions, those in northern England, Wales and Scotland used the law more than those in the south. Durham, in northeast England, was the biggest user, invoking the provisions 144 times in the past year, as authorities cracked down on offenses including fraud.

In April, council workers spent two weeks tailing a couple in Poole, southeast England, they wrongly suspected were planning to send their daughter to a school outside their designated area. Tim Joyce and Jenny Paton called the intrusion into their lives ``hugely disproportionate.''

In August, Paul Griffiths was taken to court and fined 1,000 pounds for allowing his dog to foul grass outside his home in Bristol. Griffiths said he's innocent and his pet had only been urinating when she was spotted on camera.

Brian Clements, a 79-year-old retired teacher from Clacton- on-Sea, south England, said the measures are ``like using a sledge hammer to crack a nut.''

``Wouldn't the Gestapo have loved all those little cameras,'' he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Caroline Alexander in London at calexander1@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: October 9, 2008 19:01 EDT

Crowdsourced photo survey of the UK surveillance state

The Open Rights Group in the UK is planning to crowdsource a photographic survey of the United Kingdom's surveillane aparatus on October 11. Participants are encouraged to:

1. Spot something that embodies the UK’s wholesale transformation into the surveillance society/database state. Subjects might include your local CCTV camera(s), or fingerprinting equipment in your child’s school library
2. Snap it
3. Upload it to Flickr and tag it “FNFBigPicture” - please use an Attribution Creative Commons license*

Check out: The Open Rights Group : Blog Archive » Capturing the database state: community photocall. I'll post a selection of the photos on the blog. (Via the ever-vigilant Boing Boing.)

Unsurprising expansion of UK surveillance project

A system designed to track motorists in the UK is being expanded to collect fifty million automobile movement records for five years, instead of the already intrusive two years originally announced. Alread pervasive CCTV cameras are being upgraded to capture license plates, adding to what is being said to be the largest oracle database in Europe.

See: Fears over privacy as police expand surveillance project UK news The Guardian.

Thanks to SpyBlog.org.uk for the link.

Student complains about Kiwi can cam

Sorry about the headline. I thought I could do beter than the one written by Stuff.co.nz.

I have reported on toilet cams on this site in the past, but all of those I've heard about installed by businesses have ended up to be fakes. That is until this report from New Zealand where a drunk student was roughed up by bouncers who were covertly watching him rip down a poster above the urinal.

See: Student shocked to star on club's loo-cam - New Zealand news on Stuff.co.nz.

Federal Commissioner funds research into surveillance in Canada

As part of its contributions program (Contributions Program 2008-2009 - Backgrounder - Privacy Commissioner of Canada), the Ofice of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada is funding a project to look into surveillence in Canada:

Organization: Queen’s University —The Surveillance Project, Department of Sociology

Location: Ontario

Funding amount: $50,000

Project title: Camera Surveillance in Canada: Current Trends

Project description: There is a surprising lack of Canadian research to date on the development of camera surveillance, and the proliferation of surveillance cameras in Canada is occurring without enough oversight or public debate. This project will outline Canadian trends in camera surveillance in public and private spaces by analyzing documentary sources and through interviews with key stakeholders. As part of the project, a final research report will be presented at the International Conference of Data Protection Commissioners in Strasbourg, France (Sept. 2008).

Something like this is sorely needed as police forces and others push for more surveillance of public places, while research in other countries suggest that it just moves crime from one area to another.

Good catch, David Canton, via the Commissioner's blog.

CCTV can cut both ways

Sometimes CCTV can prove that someone is innocent. And that the cops framed them.

wcbstv.com - Undercover NYPD Officers Frame 4 On Drug Charges

....The undercover NYPD officers are seen on video dancing in the street, then attempting to frame four innocent men.

"I asked police officer why are you arresting me," said Maximo Colon. "Never did I get an answer."

The investigators swore under oath they bought drugs from the four men. Jose and Maximo colon say that didn't happen.

"The cops are supposed to help us," said a shaken Jose Colon.

Defense lawyers say the surveillance cameras proved their clients were framed.

"It was nauseating," said defense lawyer Rochelle Berliner.

Two hours of video showed no contact at all between the four men arrested and undercover officers - proof that lead prosecutors to drop charges against the four men, and even declare in court the men did not commit the crime....

Marina Hyde: This surveillance onslaught is draconian and creepy

Because actions speak louder than words, one can easily assume that the British populace is completely passive and accepting of the explosion of CCTV surveillance throughout the green and pleasant lands of England. There is some dissent. Witness: Marina Hyde who has an interesting opinion piece in The Guardian.

Marina Hyde: This surveillance onslaught is draconian and creepy Comment is free The Guardian

Closed-circuit TV cameras are the crime-fighting tool so fiendishly sophisticated that they can be foiled by the wearing of a hood. Yet having stuck 4.2 million of the things around this country, with nary a consultation on the matter - nor any significant impact on crime statistics - efforts to pimp them to 2.0 status continue

This week it emerged that scientists at Portsmouth University are developing "listening" cameras. Artificial intelligence software will be able to recognise sounds such as breaking glass, so that, when such a noise is detected, they can rotate in its direction and capture the act of vandalism/terrorism/God that resulted in a milk bottle falling off your doorstep. I paraphrase slightly, but given that the most recent Home Office report on the matter found that better street lighting is seven times more effective at cutting crime than CCTV, the truly suspicious behaviour is our deepening obsession with surveillance.

The past few years have thrown up dozens of instances which made one wince to be a citizen of this septic isle, but a personal low came with the discovery that 500,000 bins had been fitted with electronic tracking devices. Transponders in bins ... Could any morning news item be more designed to force one back against the pillows, too embarrassed about one's country to start the day? Yes, as it turned out. A couple of months ago it was discovered that Poole borough council, in Dorset, had used the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act - designed to track serious criminals and terrorists - to determine whether a school applicant and her parents lived where they said they did. They did, and were appalled to discover they had been spied on for three weeks, the subject of surveillance notes such as "female and three children enter target vehicle and drive off". Target vehicle, if you please! The thought of some deep-cover council drone jotting this stuff down as though it were an elite Delta Force operation is not as funny as it is horrifying.

Just who are these people, these swelling legions of unelected, ill-qualified monitors who wield such extraordinary power in our surveillance society? Clarification in one case came last year, when the civilian in charge of a Worcester police station's surveillance team was suspended after detectives found, among one day's footage, a 20-minute sequence of close-ups of a woman's cleavage and backside as she walked oblivious through the streets. Whether the woman ever discovered she was the star of a kind of pervert Truman Show is not recorded. But the offending monitor escaped with a warning and was - unbelievably - back in post within weeks.

In some city centres, such as Middlesbrough, speakers have been put on the cameras, so that those monitoring can interact with potential miscreants. Let's hope these remote bossy boots imagine they're involved in some high-level negotiation, in which they talk down a teenager from his decision to drop a hamburger wrapper on the pavement.

The former home secretary John Reid, on whose draconian watch the Middlesbrough scheme was approved, even suggested at its launch that schoolchildren should enter a competition to become the voice of the cameras - once again laying bare the government's desire to co-opt its citizens into the surveillance process at all levels. We are, of course, coming up to the time of year when we are ordered to shop our neighbours for acts of hosepipe, while the Shoreditch Trust recently trialled a scheme encouraging residents to watch live CCTV feeds on a special local channel, the better to assist in policing.

For all this creepy "outreach", though, the only hands-down beneficiaries of our CCTV obsession (apart from the revenue gatherers) have been broadcasters. For no good reason, all manner of TV networks have been furnished with hours of footage to pad out their witless police chase documentaries, or offensively cheap "street crime UK" shows. Britain's CCTV network: proudly supporting the Bravo channel.

The worst thing is the blithe insistence that this is all necessary and normal. We are watched more closely, by more cameras, with each passing day. But so faultlessly designed is our society that we have never come close to having a say on it.

There's a great bit in Woody Allen's movie Deconstructing Harry when Robin Williams's character goes out of focus, appearing as a sort of fuzzy version of himself, which sounds increasingly like the sort of sickness that should be courted by any attractive woman keen to walk through Worcester. That said, she could always don a hood. Yet there does seem a vaguely depressing irony in governments insisting that constant surveillance is essential to prevent our being overrun by repressive regimes who'd make us all cover our heads and the like. It's these initiatives that drive even the most pliant members of society to dream of taking just that precaution themselves, if only for a bit of privacy.

Building China's high-technology surveillance society, with help from the US

Naomi Klein has an interesting piece in the most recent Rolling Stone on the emerging high-technology surveillance state being built in China, with help from some of largest US defence contractors:

China's All-Seeing Eye : Rolling Stone

... Now, as China prepares to showcase its economic advances during the upcoming Olympics in Beijing, Shenzhen is once again serving as a laboratory, a testing ground for the next phase of this vast social experiment. Over the past two years, some 200,000 surveillance cameras have been installed throughout the city. Many are in public spaces, disguised as lampposts. The closed-circuit TV cameras will soon be connected to a single, nationwide network, an all-seeing system that will be capable of tracking and identifying anyone who comes within its range — a project driven in part by U.S. technology and investment. Over the next three years, Chinese security executives predict they will install as many as 2 million CCTVs in Shenzhen, which would make it the most watched city in the world. (Security-crazy London boasts only half a million surveillance cameras.)

The security cameras are just one part of a much broader high-tech surveillance and censorship program known in China as "Golden Shield." The end goal is to use the latest people-tracking technology — thoughtfully supplied by American giants like IBM, Honeywell and General Electric — to create an airtight consumer cocoon: a place where Visa cards, Adidas sneakers, China Mobile cellphones, McDonald's Happy Meals, Tsingtao beer and UPS delivery (to name just a few of the official sponsors of the Beijing Olympics) can be enjoyed under the unblinking eye of the state, without the threat of democracy breaking out. With political unrest on the rise across China, the government hopes to use the surveillance shield to identify and counteract dissent before it explodes into a mass movement like the one that grabbed the world's attention at Tiananmen Square.

Remember how we've always been told that free markets and free people go hand in hand? That was a lie. It turns out that the most efficient delivery system for capitalism is actually a communist-style police state, fortressed with American "homeland security" technologies, pumped up with "war on terror" rhetoric. And the global corporations currently earning superprofits from this social experiment are unlikely to be content if the lucrative new market remains confined to cities such as Shenzhen. Like everything else assembled in China with American parts, Police State 2.0 is ready for export to a neighborhood near you....

Band "shoots" video by sending Data Protection Act requests to CCTVs that caught them performing

This is too funny.

Apparently Manchester band "The Get Out Clause" recorded a music video by performing in the vicinity of CCTV cameras and then requesting the footage under the UK Data Protection Act.

Band "shoots" video by sending Data Protection Act requests to CCTVs that caught them performing - Boing Boing