Thursday, November 27, 2014

New social media terms of service may be trumped by Canadian law

Facebook is trying to simplify its lengthy privacy policy and better explain how it targets advertisements to its 1.35 billion users.
Facebook is trying to simplify its lengthy privacy policy and better explain how it targets advertisements to its 1.35 billion users.  (Jeff Chiu/Associated Press)

Canadian privacy law may protect social media users who don't read a site's terms of use policies and unknowingly or unwittingly agree to have their information shared with other sites.

"This overriding provision in our federal privacy legislation actually does provide protection for unexpected, unreasonable uses, even with consent," said Barry Sookman, a Toronto-based lawyer and expert on internet law. "So I actually think there is a standard here that applies that is fairly useful and is consumer friendly."

CBC's Go Public reported the story of Mari Sherkin, who complained that her personal information from Facebook had ended up on the popular dating website Zoosk.com to create a profile for her.

Sharon Polsky, who heads up the independent advocacy group Privacy and Access Council of Canada, told Go Public that in Canada, "there's nothing to stop an organization from gathering that information about you and doing pretty much as they please with it as long as you're notified."

Just by visiting another website, you have agreed to their terms of service, she said.

Read full on CBC

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