Parliament should take a cautious approach to legislative proposals to create an expanded surveillance regime that would have serious repercussions for privacy rights, say Canada’s privacy guardians. Privacy commissioners and ombudspersons from across the country issued a joint resolution today urging Parliamentarians to ensure there is a clear and demonstrable need to expand the investigative…
Category: Non-U.S.
B.C. private schools hire private eyes to check parental gang ties
Sam Cooper reports: Several Vancouver private schools are screening applicants to determine if their families are linked to gangs and pose a risk to students and staff. “We have recently been engaged by private schools in the Vancouver area to conduct due diligence on the families of prospective students,” Kim Marsh, managing director of private…
Irish school’s fingerprint system may breach laws
Jimmy Woulfe of Irish Examiner reports that Salesian College in Pallaskenry’s system for fingerprinting students for attendance purposes may violate data protection legislation: A fingerprint from each hand is registered on two scanners when students arrive in the morning and return after lunch. The system cuts out an hour’s work every day compiling rolls. However,…
Japan’s govt., private firms to tackle cell phone music piracy
The Yomiuri Shimbun reports: The Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry and the telecom and music industries plan to jointly introduce a system to prevent cell phone users from downloading illegally distributed music files to their cell phones via the Internet, it has been learned. The system, which could be operational as early as fiscal 2010,…