Facebook Faces the Canadian Privacy Commissioner 140
dakohli writes "Canwest's Sarah Schmidt writes that Facebook has until Monday to find a way to fix its 'serious privacy gaps.' And if the Canadian Privacy Commissioner isn't happy with the Web Company's response, then she has two weeks to push it to the Canadian Federal Court in Ottawa. 'A spokeswoman for the commission said it's premature to say whether the feud will end up in court. This would be an international first for Facebook, which has grown to more than 200 million users since its launch in 2004.'"
Just add to the EULA... (Score:2)
Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:5, Insightful)
That one phrase is one of the most interesting and most insulting that can be used. Void where prohibited is the same as saying we're not sure where a judge will rule this illegal, but in case they do, you lose. Why not be user friendly (anyone remember that phrase?) and say what laws you ARE in compliance with, perhaps listing a reference to your licensing documents? Even lawyers are prohibited from practicing law in regions they are not licensed for. Yes, I realize that the WWW is not quite the same thing, but in the EULA you should mention all the regions where it is legal and above board since the L in EULA stands for license. As a user, if you don't know where you are in compliance, how the hell am I supposed to know? While 'buyer beware' always applies, in this day and age, it's not unreasonable to expect that a service list where it is in compliance with privacy laws in their privacy statement.
As far as Facebook users should be concerned, if the government of Canada thinks there are privacy violations, there are... at least until Facebook clears the matter up unequivocally and publicly. After all, how can I in good faith sign or accept a EULA if I cannot be sure your service is in compliance with the applicable laws? DING That is to say that EULAs are wrong from word one, but staying on point, if there is to be one, shouldn't the burden be on the provider to show what privacy laws they are in compliance with?
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Or, how about, users research what they are getting into in the first place? Do you seriously expect facebook to go through the law books on every national and local level and state which laws, where, they are in compliance with, AND keep up-to-date on them? That's impossible, and ridiculous. I can't seriously fathom how you could seriously consider forcing someone to go through laws everywhere stating how they are in compliance with them.
Do you own a web site? Any sort of a web site? Good, because tha
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Do you seriously expect facebook to go through the law books on every national and local level and state which laws, where, they are in compliance with, AND keep up-to-date on them?
Just provide a link to Pacer [wikipedia.org] and the Canadian equivalent. (grin)
Reminds me of the old joke:
GIVEN: The entire body of current mathematical thought;
PROOF: The proof follows by examination. QED.
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Given: ZFC
Prove: Fermat's Last Theorem
This exam has a time limit of 2 hours. Begin.
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In this case it's probably more akin to -
Given: ZFC
Prove: The continuum hypothesis
Given the legal systems of every country on Earth, I'm pretty sure you can find at least two contradictory laws.
Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:5, Funny)
I would first like to take this opportunity to complain about the size of the margins on the paper supplied to students...
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I can't seriously fathom how you could seriously consider forcing someone to go through laws everywhere stating how they are in compliance with them.
Someone, somewhere, has to do it, whether the consumer or the provider of the service. Companies should be paying the 'nice' men in three-piece suits to say, actually do some work, rather than expecting the user (or the government) to point out when they've done fucked up. The casual user isn't likely to know the law very well, outside of the basics, nor do they have the resources to fully research and understand, particularly when it comes to determining judicial interpretation and precedent--unless they
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Also, your portrayal of the lawyers is kind of ridiculous. Lawyers aren't being lazy. The
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If you put the burden of websites to be compliant with every law in the world, it is going to be very difficult for small sites and startups.
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An EULA is a contract, and the first rule of contracts is that they cannot constitute anything illegal. You may sign a contract giving a third party full permission to murder you, but since murder is illegal, a jury will still convict said third party.
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Why not? Any brick and mortar store would have to if they tried to expand into an area. If companies can't be arsed to look up the laws which apply to their business in a country they support, then they shouldn't be doing business there.
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They do business with people within those nations, but are not actually situated within those nations, unless of course they have some headquarters in that nation (or locality).
The principle here that applies to facebook also applies to Joe Normals' personal website where he allows people to post comments or perhaps even has his own message board. As he is collecting and storing user information, he, as per the parent's suggestion, as the obligation to go through each and every legal district in the world
Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:5, Insightful)
They do business with people within those nations, but are not actually situated within those nations, unless of course they have some headquarters in that nation (or locality).
No. They don't need to headquarters in a nation. They don't even need a branch office. They don't need any staff at all. They only need to have a "presence".
So what is a "presence"?
Pretty much anything that is selling OR promoting your product or service in Canada would count -- "doing business in Canada".
Facebook in particular has deals with the major wireless carriers to promote 'facebook on your mobile phone', and that would qualify it having a Canadian presence. It is actively doing business in Canada.
But Joe Average American running a blog, per your example, is merely accessible from Canada, and he and his site don't have any Canadian presence.
Now if facebook doesn't actually have any offices or staff in Canada, there's not really much that the Canadian government can do directly to them, even if they are deemed to have a presence. But it can go after facebooks canadian partners (such as the aforementioned wireless carriers) and force them to cease dealing with facebook which gives them some limited leverage over facebook insofar as they can make it so that if facebook wants to continue running promotions in Canada, and have its 'app' and 'bookmarks' and whatnot preloaded on phones then it has to meet whatever laws are in place.
Meanwhile they would have zero leverage over your example Joe Average American blogger, who couldn't care what the Canadian governement does in Canada.
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I guess I am a little pig headed
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A. Create a new holding company in a different country (say USA or somewhere with desirable local laws) - transfer said .ca domain to new holding company. B. Change the main page to "This Site no longer exists. Try going to whatevermysiteis.COM" C. Tell offending government to go pound sand.
CIRA won't allow said holding company to take ownership of the domain unless said holding company has a Canadian presence. With .ca domains, they can't be under the control of anyone who isn't operating within Canada, for the most part.
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I see what you're saying, but really, if I set up a website that is called SpeakingFrenchSucks.ca just to bash the French language, is that operating in Canada? The site consists of nothing but say a blog or a forum where folks can leave their thoughts - is that operating in Canada?" What if I add google ads and collect some ad revenue, do I have a presence now?
There is nothing to stop a company from (via a unconnected holding company) creating a redirect page of sorts f
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I see what you're saying, but really, if I set up a website that is called SpeakingFrenchSucks.ca just to bash the French language, is that operating in Canada?
No, you've got it entirely backwards.
You *can't* register SpeakingFrenchSucks.ca *unless* you are "operating in Canada", as per the rules as set out by CIRA.
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I think, correct me if I am wrong, what you're saying is, by registering this domain, I agree to be bound by the CIRA?
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I think, correct me if I am wrong, what you're saying is, by registering this domain, I agree to be bound by the CIRA?
Correct. Specifically, by registering a .ca domain, you are bound by CIRA's Registrant Agreement [www.cira.ca], which, among other things, includes the Canadian Presence Requirements [www.cira.ca]. Violating those requirements will result in the cancellation of your domain name registration (assuming you're caught, of course... odds are Facebook would be).
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Oh, and I forgot to mention, in addition to the requirements placed on registrants, CIRA also has a set of rules for registrars [www.cira.ca]. Of interest is item 2.1:
So, not only did you violate the terms of the registrant agreement, but godaddy is also not doing their diligence to ensure they are enforcing the presence requirements. 'course, it m
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It probably wouldn't fly if I stated "Her Majesty the Queen" for the kind of Canadian I am....
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Create a new holding company in a different country (say USA or somewhere with desirable local laws) - transfer said .ca domain to new holding company.
Holding company has to have a Canadian presence to hold a .ca.
Try going to whatevermysiteis.COM" C. Tell offending government to go pound sand.
Except they can do more than pound sand, at least as long as FB is doing stuff in Canada, like running advertising.
I guess I am a little pig headed in all this - but really? Some country that you don't even have a pres
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You're saying this because they have obtained local domains (.ca, .jp, etc)?
Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:5, Informative)
The Privacy Commissioner is an officer of parliament (who reports directly to the Senate and the House of Commons), not an official of the Government of Canada.
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Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:4, Interesting)
The Government of Canada is currently led by Stephen Harper. The Parliament of Canada is 308 House of Commons members and 105 Senators; the government answers to the House of Commons, and the Governor General asks the membership of the Commons to form a government from their membership which, by custom, is the leader of the majority party. Parliament is above the Government, and serves to keep the Government in check.
Technically, then, the Government is a part of the Parliament, not the other way around.
(Fun fact: There are actually three components of Parliament: The House, the Senate, and the Library of Parliament.)
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Care to define the difference? Because you're splitting hairs at best.
Re:Just add to the EULA... (Score:4, Informative)
Someone who reports directly to the house and senate is beholden to them. This means committees not individual people like normal bureaucrats, which means there is a much higher level of standard regarding issues when push comes to shove in a body like this. The privacy commissioner is not a regulatory agency like the CRTC, it's an actual oversight board and committee meant to safeguard the privacy of the citizens of Canada.
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A parliamentary officer is much more likely to act in the interest of the people than is a government official. The parliamentary officer, particularly if he reports to BOTH houses, is probably not going to particularly partisan and has to worry less about being replaced if he irritates the prime minister.
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The Privacy Commissioner is an officer of parliament (who reports directly to the Senate and the House of Commons), not an official of the Government of Canada.
Officer == Official. He works for the government and is paid by Canadian taxpayers. He is ergo a government official.
The presumption of corruption and abuse may now resume.
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I can see it as being reasonable in some cases. One of the most common is with contests and giveaways, which essentially means, "if contests with cash prizes such as this one aren't allowed where you live, then you can't enter this contest, obviously".
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especially the country that... is ...just north of the US ...just north of the US
especially the country that leads the world in being just north of the US (lol?)
especially the country that lays...
Which is it?
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I like the middle one. I'm not the same AC, but lets just pretend I am and say thats what I meant.
Finally (Score:5, Insightful)
At least one country is going to try to close this massive loophole of never destroying a user's information when they want to remove their account. I mean I can understand that being able to just "deactivate" an account is useful when a user just wants to stop using facebook for a while but how hard is it to have a remove feature that deletes a users information?
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how hard is it to have a remove feature that deletes a users information?
Not very hard at all, but it's handy to keep your users' information even after they deactivate their accounts if it doesn't get you into trouble.
Facebook could just implement some of these changes for Canadian citizens or people with a Canadian IP, but I hope this has international consequences.
Leave it to Canada to solve all our problems, eh?
Re:Finally (Score:5, Insightful)
It's more complicated when the data may be the result of collaborative effort. If two users have a detailed conversation, then one wants all data associated with them deleted, what happens when the other user complains?
Now in that case it still seems fairly clear that the privacy concern should come first, but as we get increasingly collaborative works, where is the line drawn? Let's say someone makes a Facebook app that lets multiple users create works of art together, or literature. There is another side to this issue.
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That may be how things work.
Is that how they should work?
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"That is a special case, yes, but I would assume that, with a collaborative work, when one person dissents to continued display or holding of that work, the other(s) can't over-rule them on that, and the content would have to be taken down/removed."
IANAL either, but it seems on a naive reading that that policy would be incompatible with Open Content such as the GFDL/cc-by-sa. Because the first rule of open content is that nobody gets to remove ANYTHING after it's published, 'privacy' or any other personal p
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Now in that case it still seems fairly clear that the privacy concern should come first
Does it? Why are you posting on slashdot? You can't delete your posts once posted! I think once you post something you make it public. No take backs allowed. It's not a privacy concern. If I run out and tell everyone I eat worms, I don't get to destroy everyone else's memories if I decide I want to take it back. If I print an ad in the newspaper I can't ask for all copies of the paper destroyed if I change my mind.
It's on
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vs
The corporate charter that companies such as Facebook are granted.
Corporate charters historically were granted very rarely and can be revoked (still). The legal prop that gives so many ball-busting industrial monoliths the power to trample governments, and citizens is that an incorporated company has become a weird person/non-person hybrid. This relentless leg
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Quite an interesting analogy between corporations and AI. Mostly because a corporation is already what we'd fear most in an AI: Intelligence without moral or conscience.
Sure, a corporation is still staffed with humans and every human might have a conscience. But he can put it at ease and silence it, citing the "necessity" to do what he does. Take layoffs. Joe in accounting is going to be sacked, with a pregnant wife, three kids and mortgage payments he can't handle if he didn't have this job. You're his sup
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I'm going to disagree with you. I've seen an explanation from facebook follow quite the same logic as your post. Without being rude, I'd like to say maybe you've seen that and taken the idea too far. It's certainly true that an entity such as an 'email' can exist in two places (their sent box, your inbox). With a closed system, this will typically be handled in two ways, either make two copies or two references to the same copy. In both cases, when both users request deletion, the content should be erased c
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At least one country is going to try to close this massive loophole of never destroying a user's information when they want to remove their account. I mean I can understand that being able to just "deactivate" an account is useful when a user just wants to stop using facebook for a while but how hard is it to have a remove feature that deletes a users information?
If I close my Slashdot account, will Slashdot purge all of my posts as well?
Re:Finally (Score:4, Insightful)
You have have dozens or even hundreds of backups of said data, which may or may not be fully accounted for.
If anyone who has my personal data can't account for what they've done with it, that's a much bigger concern than not deleting it; quite frankly, if someone tells me they don't know where (X) went, how can they tell me that entity (Y) doesn't have it?
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if someone tells me they don't know where (X) went, how can they tell me that entity (Y) doesn't have it?
Well it's incredibly difficult to prove the negative statement. The burden of proof would ordinarily fall upon you to prove that Y does have it before accusing X of having passed it to them, and that's assuming that Z didn't breach a contract with X while passing the information to Y.
Basically the lesson is, if you don't want the information public, don't post it on the internet.
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If I provide such information, on good faith, to a company (who issues a privacy policy detailing how they disseminate and secure my information)
I'd like to familiarize you with a part of the facebook privacy policy relevant to the claims you are making:
Keeping your information private on Facebook... (Score:4, Insightful)
Keep your private information private by not posting it on Facebook!
Re:Keeping your information private on Facebook... (Score:5, Insightful)
The only way to do that is never use facebook at all, perhaps the solution I should adopt myself, but it's a bit too late.
The problem I have been having is what other people in my network post about me. I have no control over that and no right to demand it be removed other than politely asking but most people dont listen to such requests because they dont understand why someone might care. Apart from being tagged in numerous photos most of the events i go to are listed as having me invited regardless of the fact I never read the invites.
Basically from a careful computer aided study of facebook you can find out for the average user:
A 3d model of their whole body with especially detailed facial features
Their location a percentage of the time without variable certainty
A fairly accurate weighted graph of most of their associates and friends (plus all the listed information about those people)
A rough idea of their habits, personality and political leaning
I am no privacy nut but this is more information than i want about me on the web. I think people fail to understand how much can be extrapolated from a massive database of small details.
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You do have the option of having no friends on Facebook. Similarly, if you don't go out in public you don't have the problem of your friends taking pictures of you. There's always the unibomber style shack life, consider it.
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Actually, I use Facebook because I can control what of my private information I put out on the web. If I used my blog or twitter, or posted my photos on Flickr, everyone would be able to see them. With Facebook I can address a closed, authenticated user group.
It really depends on how you use Facebook IMO, and yeah, if other people leave stuff about you, that's bad.
I guess people love communication and hate feeling alone; not using social networks can not be the answer. It's like "don't use phones" because t
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Here is an interesting privacy issue that Facebook has had for YEARS.
Alice posts an album with one photo that has her friend, user Bob, tagged in it. User Charles, who is friends with Bob (but not Alice) will more likely than not get an update saying "Your friend Bob just got tagged in an album!" and now Charles can see the entire album that Alice posted, whether or not Bob is actually in any more than one photo. This can also happen if Bob, instead of being tagged in the album, merely comments on a photo i
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X only gets update about Y(who he doesn't knows) photos if one of the first two is selected (must people chose the first).
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1. Cross-link Facebook, Slashdot, Twitter, Second Life, Google Earth
2. Create detailed 3D body model for all Slashdotters
3. Render 3D models to latex masks [youtube.com].
4. Render 3D models to simulated virtual environment [opencroquet.org]
5. Capture, drug and equip Slashdotters with goggles [i-glassesstore.com]
6. Replace real-world Slashdotters with robot duplicates [vub.ac.be].
7. Profit! [webcomicsnation.com]
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1. Cross-link Facebook, Slashdot, Twitter, Second Life, Google Earth
2. Create detailed 3D body model for all Slashdotters
3. Render 3D models to latex masks.
4. Render 3D models to simulated virtual environment
5. Capture, drug and equip Slashdotters with goggles
6. Replace real-world Slashdotters with robot duplicates.
7. Profit!
Steps 1-5 are a lot of effort when you could just create a large number of over and under weight asexual robots with no body strength that consume caffeine and pizza, and end up with a
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The only way to do that is never use facebook at all
Bingo!
perhaps the solution I should adopt myself, but it's a bit too late.
Only for older information.
The problem I have been having is what other people in my network post about me. I have no control over that and no right to demand it be removed other than politely asking but most people dont listen
You've got no control over what people say about you period, beyond the ability perhaps to sue (which is one way to solve the problem, sue all your friends and
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Who do you think will do the analysis. Some people can get the data anyway.
A 3d model of their whole body with especially detailed facial features
The government can already get that from your passport photo, driver license photo, security camera photos etc.
Their location a percentage of the time without variable certainty
If you carry a mobile phone your phone company and the government can both track you far better. The government knows when you enter and leave the country, and, in many countries, knows where you are going (at least initially). Uising credit cards or ATMs or any other interaction with a bank creates a trail that can be foll
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I do have an account on various online media. None of which contain any information about me that would immediately allow you to make a connection to the person that I really am. There are no names, there are no locations (going so far that I try to avoid as good as I can to tell what country I come from), there are no friends that aren't exclusive for the online medium I participate in. There are different ICQ numbers and mail accounts for every online group, with different names. The names I choose are us
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I think the average person grossly overestimates the value of this data. In short, unless you're a celebrity, or stalked by an ex, or something, *NOBODY CARES* about this data. (Other than friends, viewing it for its intended purposes, of course.)
And if you're a celebrity, or being stalked, odds are you take some extra privacy measures in your every day life (don't leave blinds up, etc.), so maybe you should take similar measures online (don't publish friends lists to the world).
Facebook does have some pr
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Seriously though, if people don't like Facebook's policies just stop using Facebook.
The thing at issue is that doesn't solve the problem of them having your data.
One week later ... (Score:3, Funny)
Facebook announces that it will open up a new data center in Ontario.
monday morning (Score:1, Troll)
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Yeah, that sure makes sense given that Canada has the highest per-capita Facebook usage in the world. How nice of you to think it acceptable just to cut off Canadians. What a fucking asshole. You know, we would really appreciate a way to solve this without just banning us from the service.
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You know, we would really appreciate a way to solve this without just banning us from the service.
Actually, that's the purpose of just banning you from the service -- getting you pissed off enough to call this person, who, if she gets enough calls, would presumably let Facebook do whatever they want.
I don't agree with this -- I think Facebook really should just start actually deleting people's information when they make that request. But there have been times when I really think a website should've taken similar steps -- for example, one of the bigger ways for Google to help net neutrality would be to c
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block all canadian access to facebook. put an explanation of why with the contact person from the canadian privacy comission. problem solved.
awesome idea...then no one would be able to delete their own accounts...and they couldn't complain either...right?
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they should also block the data collection division of the US Government...AT&T
Fixed that for ya.
Finally (Score:3, Funny)
This will force the Canadians to Bomb the Baldwin family.
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Question: Why should Facebook care? (Score:2)
Last I checked, Facebook was a US company with no presence in Canada. Do they really have to care about Canada's laws?
I mean, if I start a website and let anybody use it, I'm not suddenly subject to Canada's privacy laws just because some Canadian uses it.
Or am I mistaken somehow, and FB does have an actual physical presence in Canada?
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Last I checked, Facebook was a US company with no presence in Canada.
When was the last time you checked, exactly [facebook.ca]? And, yes, owning a .ca domain means they have a Canadian presence.
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At least 4.5 years ago...
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Re:Canada? Does it matter? (Score:5, Insightful)
More importantly to Canada, it means roughly a third of the entire country is on Facebook. That's getting into the realm of national security concerns when detailed information that much of your population resides in a foreign country.
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Um... is anyone aware that in Canada we send sensitive and CLASSIFIED information on our citizens to foreign goverments, and no that information does not get deleted on user request. I think if the policy is good enough for Facebook it's certainly good enough for the CIA/FBI/State Department. We also let foreign government's run experiments with illicit drugs on our citizens, but I'm sure it's far more important for the privacy commissioner to investigate voluntarily shared information with another company
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RMCP: o hai!
FBI: i can haz your citizens informazions?
RMCP: here r ur recordz of bill mahr arar, many lulz
FBI: free trip to syria courtesy of Club Fed.
RMCP: o rly?
FBI: rly!
RMCP: kthxbye!
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Unless you're amazing enough to actually show up on a CSIS or RCMP watch list, then you're not getting your information shared with other governments. If you're at that point already, then there's a national security issue for nations which you're friendly with. Figure that one out yet?
So here's a big surprise, personal information of 10m citizens that are silly enough to post it is actually a rather big issue. And not to forget that the privacy act does exist for a reason, but I'm sure you've already re
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Just to add to this, if you've ever crossed into the US (land/sea/air, doesn't matter), you may have been asked if you've ever been arrested, charged, or been in court, etc. That information is right there on their computer screen as they ask you. They usually just want you to verify it.. "Why yes officer, I have in fact been to court, but the case was dismissed and no charges were laid."
Also, if you've ever applied for a foreign visa (I have), that country's intelligence service will probably ask your home
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Access does not equal retained. Repeat that after me. If you don't understand that, there's no hope for you. Welcome to the cold, cold world of reality. American police don't have direct access to CPIC FYI, no American agency does. They still have to request information the old fashioned way. If you have information in the US via the internal US system, well that means you've managed to get on the internal databases, that means you've been stopped, are already on the watch lists in Canada and there via
MOD PARENT TROLL (Score:2, Insightful)
Anyone that would express, in public no less, such a statement is inherently less important by whichever ignorant metric a person like you would measure such things.
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Canada? Does it matter?
Is that another US-American saying I have yet to learn?
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Take anything and everything that Canwest reports with several large grains of salt. This is a media company that forbids the editors of their local newspapers from writing their own articles. At Canwest all opinions must come from head office.
Why do I need opinions from the news?
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Why should news publications not offer any editorials or analysis... as they've been doing for centuries? Raw data in and of itself is not particularly useful.
And why was this modded Informative when in fact it's just the opposite?
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Too bad there's no such thing as an unbiased editorial or analysis. Filtering or summarising data requires that assumptions be made as to what's relevant/important/etc. And -- as I discovered when I worked in the industry (~8 years doing radio news) -- no matter how "objective" you try to be, someone is always going to give you grief because your writeup of the story doesn't jibe with their own bias.
I agree that one should be aware of and acknowledge one's biases, but you ask for the impossible.
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Oh well...I just live here.
Tip of the iceberg.. (Score:2)
If that gets you angry you better not use Google's web albums. I wonder why on earth the NSA gets so much money for IT taps where Google is already doing everything required.
That's not all, have you ever read their Terms of Service? If not, I suggest a quick read of specifically point 11 and see if you understand what happens if you use ANY Google service..
Searching, fine. Anything else - avoid, it is most certainly NOT free..
Avoiding Gmail is getting hard (Score:2)