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Michael Geist Blog

• Privacy Commissioner of Canada Sets Out Targets for PIPEDA Reform

  Privacy Commissioner of Canada Jennifer Stoddart this morning set out her office's goals for PIPEDA reform. The last attempt to reform the private sector privacy law stalled in the House of Commons with Bill C-12 still technically alive (having been sitting at second reading for months) but destined to die once the government hits the legislative reset button in the summer. The five-year mandatory review of PIPEDA is now years behind schedule, so Stoddart's attempt to kick-start the process is a welcome development. The PIPEDA report focuses on four areas of reform: stronger enforcement powers, mandatory security breach disclosure, increased transparency...

• The Copyright Pentalogy: Copyright Collective Management

  This week I wrote about the need for reform of the Copyright Board of Canada. Copyright collective management is addressed in two chapters of The Copyright Pentalogy: How the Supreme Court of Canada Shook the Foundations of Canadian Copyright Law, an effort by many of Canada's leading copyright scholars to begin the process of examining the long-term implications of the copyright pentalogy. ...

• Canadian Library Association on Access Copyright Lawsuit

  The Canadian Library Association issued a statement late last week on the Access Copyright lawsuit filed against York University, urging it to abandon the lawsuit and pointing to several legal concerns.

• Competition Bureau To Investigate Google Canada

  The National Post reports that the Competition Bureau of Canada plans to launch an investigation into Google Canada. The scope of the investigation is unknown.

• Next on the Canadian Copyright Reform Agenda: Clean Up the Mess at the Copyright Board

  With the latest phase of Canadian copyright reform now complete, the government may soon turn to the question of what comes next. Given last year's major legislative overhaul and the landmark series of copyright decisions from the Supreme Court of Canada, significant substantive changes are unlikely to be on the agenda for the foreseeable future. Instead, my weekly technology law column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) argues that it is time for the government to set its sights on the Copyright Board of Canada, a relatively obscure regulatory body that sets the fees to be paid for the use of...