Privacy & Information Security Law Blog

In SACEM v. Cyrille Saminadin (Cour de Cassation, chambre criminelle, 13 janvier 2009), the SACEM (a representative body of authors, composers, and music editors) asked one of its agents to carry out an investigation and to collect evidence of copyright infringements on a peer-to-peer network. After selecting a peer-to-peer network, the agent manually typed in the title of a song belonging to one of the rights holders and searched for all available files corresponding to this title. The agent then randomly selected one of these files and saved all the information relating to it (IP address, country of origin, name of the internet service provider, etc.) onto a CD-ROM as evidence for use in filing a complaint. The question raised in this case was whether such activity constitutes data processing requiring the prior authorization of the French Data Protection Authority (CNIL).

On February 4, 2009 the Trilateral Committee on Transborder Data Flows met in Mexico City.  The committee is comprised of representatives from the Canadian, Mexican and U.S. governments and is part of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America.  The Trilateral Committee invited representatives from the private sector to give testimony on current and potential impediments to the free flow of personal data in North America.

On December 2, 2008, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled in K.U. v. Finland that Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights requires national laws to protect individuals from serious online privacy infringements, but also that the national legal framework must allow for the identification and prosecution of offenders. This case involved an advertisement of a sexual nature, which was placed on an Internet dating site on behalf of the applicant, who was twelve years old at the time, without his knowledge ...

The Centre for Information Policy Leadership’s Executive Director, Marty Abrams, brings you these thoughts on a recent data protection summit in Barcelona.

Harmonized international data protection rules have been privacy’s Holy Grail since the EU Directive was enacted in 1995. Harmonized, globally recognized rules would simplify life for privacy protection authorities and companies. Numerous efforts have been undertaken to create a harmonized code. The most recent, an international standards project led by the Spanish Data Protection Commissioner, began on January 12 as international privacy experts met in Barcelona. The Spanish Data Protection Commissioner leads the project, and the finished product — a harmonized privacy code that will be the basis for a data protection treaty— will be a center-piece of the 31st International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners on November 2009 in Madrid. 

The Barcelona meeting focused on a draft standards document developed by the Spanish Data Protection Authority, Agencia Espanola de Proteccion de Datos.  The document integrates many of the elements from the OECD Privacy Guidelines, Council of Europe Convention, EU Directive and APEC Privacy Framework.  In its 30 sections, the document recognizes almost every concept found in this existing guidance.

On December 5, 2008, the Austrian data protection authority ("DPA") issued its first decision on the implementation of a whistleblowing hotline as required by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act ("SOX"), to be administered by the Austrian subsidiary of a U.S.-based company. The DPA partly approved the data transfers from the Austrian entity to the U.S. entity for the purpose of enabling it to prosecute "serious incidents" caused by the behavior of executive managers. The DPA ordered the Austrian subsidiary to implement a contract guarantying data subjects the ability to exercise their rights ...

A law that could increase the level of protection of personal information is circulating among legislative bodies in China. The proposed PRC Tort Liability Law would include clauses providing protections for personal information, by giving a person whose rights are infringed by the use of Internet services a right to demand deletion of the infringing materials. Another clause imposes liability on an Internet service provider that fails to take timely measures after receiving such a demand. Read more...

On December 1, 2008, a strict anti-spam law came into effect in Israel.  The legislation, enacted as an amendment to the country’s Communications Law, prohibits the delivery of advertisements using mobile text messaging, email, fax or automatic dialing systems without first obtaining the recipient’s explicit written consent.  The law contains several exceptions to the prior consent requirement.  For example, advertisers may reach out to businesses to inquire whether they wish to receive marketing communications.  Advertisers also may send unsolicited marketing ...

Scarcely a month after the world media was flooded with news of the catastrophic terrorist attacks in Mumbai, headlines are once again rife with articles on the global impact of events in India. This time, the news has focused on Satyam Computer Services (“Satyam”), previously one of India’s largest and most prestigious outsourcing providers, and a series of missteps that began in October 2008, when alarming allegations of possible involvement in a customer security breach surfaced in the media. After that news, there were allegations of misdeeds with customers, a failed ...

On October 1, 2008, the Article 29 Working Party issued a toolkit on Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs) aimed at promoting them as a mechanism for transferring data to countries without an adequate level of data protection. The toolkit includes: (1) a table highlighting the elements and principles to be found in BCRs (WP 153); (2) a document setting up a framework for the structure of BCRs (WP 154); and (3) a revised version of the FAQs on BCRs (WP 155). The toolkit also announced the creation of a mutual recognition procedure between nine national data protection authorities ...