According to CTV News, a Quebec movie theatre is liable for $10,000 in damages when it searched a family's bags (ostensibly for video recording equipment) and exposed the eldest daugther's birth control pills to her unknowing parents. See: CTV.ca Cinema ordered to pay $10K in damages for search.

(Before extending this decision to the rest of Canada, remember that the private right of damages for privacy invasion is different in Quebec.)

Labels: privacy, quebec, tort

I got a number of calls today from media outlets today about a controversy that has erupted in Montreal. It appears a Second Cup franchisee recently installed a fake surveillance camera in bathroom stalls in an effort to dissuade drug users from using the bathrooms to shoot up.

My thoughts are summed up in the following quote from the Canadian press:

The Canadian Press: Montreal Second Cup owner forced to take down bathroom surveillance camera

... Still, privacy advocates are uncomfortable with the creeping presence of cameras in more intimate places such as bathrooms. Whether the camera works or not, the effect, they say, is the same.

"One of the weird things about this area of law is the fact that it is designed in many ways to protect people's feelings," said David Fraser, a privacy lawyer based in Halifax. ."It's about people not wanting to feel they're under surveillance."

For Fraser, the underlying issue is the sense of violation that comes with feeling one's private space is being subjected to anonymous, prying eyes.

"There isn't any real material difference between a fake camera and a real camera," he said. "Whether they're real or fake, you still have the feeling of being watched." ...

Labels: privacy, quebec, surveillance, video surveillance

I was interviewed about this on a Montreal radio station on Friday. It's an interesting issue, because information is not being collected:

Toilet cam working even when it doesn't

Toilet cam working even when it doesn't

Mall customer outraged but landlord says dummy is effective

MICHELLE LALONDE, The Gazette

Published: Friday, August 03

Yes, that's a real surveillance camera on the ceiling of the men's washroom off the food court of Les Cours Mont Royal - but don't worry, it's not operating.

That reassurance was not good enough for at least one Montreal businessman who was outraged to see a video camera in a public bathroom at the downtown Montreal mall.

The camera is inside a protective dome and appears to be pointed toward the washroom's common area, where the urinals are. As of yesterday, there were no signs explaining what the camera is for or whether it is on.

When the man asked a maintenance person about the camera, he was told it wasn't actually functioning but was there to discourage certain activities.

"If the video surveillance is not functional, what assurances do we have that it will not be in the future?"the man wrote in a complaint to mall owners Soltron Realty Inc., which he forwarded to The Gazette on the condition his name not be published.

"If it is functional," the letter continued, "who is watching, is the information secure and will we find our pictures on the Internet? ... I find the use of surveillance camera (real or fake) inside a washroom to be absolutely unethical, immoral and most likely illegal." Unless the camera is removed within 10 days, the man said, he will lodge a complaint with Quebec's privacy commission.

A spokesperson for Soltron said the camera was installed in the washroom several years ago to discourage "sexual misconduct and drug use." Carmela Amorosa, marketing director for Soltron, said the company realized it was illegal to place an operating camera in a public bathroom, but felt some action was necessary.

"It is working," Amorosa said. "Now we don't have these problems. We are doing this to protect our customers from this sort of behaviour in the bathroom." But the case raises questions about the right to privacy and video surveillance, said sources in Quebec's Justice Department, as well as federal and provincial agencies that safeguard privacy.

"People are right to be concerned about being monitored," said Colin McKay, of the federal Office of the Privacy Commissioner.

"The case is interesting because they are not technically collecting information, they are just giving that impression. But perception for a lot of people is a legitimate concern. If they are doing it as a deterrent, they should make that clear." Luc Fortin, an aide to Benot Pelletier, the cabinet minister responsible for Quebec's privacy commission, said it is unclear whether a complaint about camera surveillance in a public washroom would be heard by the Privacy Commission or the Human Rights Commission.

"If it is a question of voyeurism, that would clearly be a case for the Human Rights Commission, but if the camera is being used to gather information and set up a file about a specific person, it would be something we would deal with," Fortin said.

"It's not technically illegal" to install video cameras in public bathrooms, "but companies that do it certainly risk complaints," said Robert Sylvestre of the Quebec Human Rights Commission.

Several court cases have resulted in jurisprudence and a set of principles about video surveillance in public places, he said.

"One of those principles is that the operator of the camera should be able to show that other methods have been tried and failed before they resorted to this."

Labels: media-mention, privacy, quebec, surveillance, vanity, video surveillance