INTRODUCTION In today’s workplace, privacy is an evolving issue and Canadian privacy law is developing rapidly. Perhaps surprisingly, only a handful of Canadian jurisdictions, (including British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Newfoundland) have privacy legislation that creates a statutory tort or civil right of action for invasion of privacy. Until recently, most Canadian jurisdictions couldContinue reading “Opening the Door for Intrusion upon Seclusion: The Common Law Tort of Invasion of Privacy and what it means for Employers”
Common Law Tort of Invasion of Privacy
Common Law Tort of Invasion of Privacy: while British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Newfoundland all have general privacy legislation creating a statutory tort or civil right of action for invasion of privacy, most other Canadian jurisdictions do not have comparable legislation although they may have some statutory administrative schemes that govern and regulate privacy issuesContinue reading “Common Law Tort of Invasion of Privacy”
Privacy in the Workplace: Use of spyware surveillance
Workplace use of spyware surveillance in BC The issue of employees’ misusing company computers is commonplace. In 2000, Xerox was monitoring all of its 92,000 employees’ computer usage and terminated 40 employees in the United States for accessing pornography on work time[1]. Similarly, the luxury automobile company, Rolls Royce, suspended 14 employees for inappropriate useContinue reading “Privacy in the Workplace: Use of spyware surveillance”
Right of Privacy in the workplace not absolute
In British Columbia, the Privacy Act (“Act”) enacted in 1968 was the first in the country. It created a statutory tort or civil right of action for an invasion of privacy when the common law did not. Section 1 of the Act reads: Violation of Privacy Actionable 1 (1) It is a tort, actionable without proofContinue reading “Right of Privacy in the workplace not absolute”