Court ruling weakens privacy of e-mail A court case in New Brunswick has prompted legal experts to warn that e-mail accounts are not nearly as private as many people believe. The case involves Toronto-based Loblaw Cos. Ltd., which is trying to find out who has been e-mailing employees salary information about senior managers in the company's distribution division. According to documents filed in the Court of Queen's Bench, someone obtained confidential payroll information for a number of managers and then sent an e-mail to employees with the details. The company traced the source of the e-mails to an account with Aliant Telecom, which provides telephone and Internet service across Atlantic Canada. This week, after a brief hearing, the court ordered Aliant to give Loblaw all information about the e-mail account. Loblaw officials declined to comment on the case. Shane Goguen, Aliant's lawyer, also declined to discuss the case beyond saying the company will comply with the order. Loblaw has yet to say whether they will pursue the matter further in the courts. The case is one of the first of its kind in Canada, but Michael Power, an Ottawa lawyer who specializes in privacy issues, said Canadians better get used to having their e-mail accounts subject to these kinds of challenges. "I think you will find more and more lawyers are quite comfortable seeking electronic evidence and accordingly applying to the courts for orders seeking the production of information," he said. Internet service providers "are not immune to this trend and they are really a target since they may hold information, i.e. e-mails or records of communications." He added that "in the past [request for e-mail accounts] have come in the criminal context. But as lawyers get more and more comfortable with the idea of dealing with electronic evidence you are going to see it come up more in the civil context." This week, New York-based Verizon Communications Inc., the largest phone company in the United States, was forced to give a record industry trade group the names of on-line subscribers accused of illegally copying music over the Internet. Verizon has been locked in a prolonged legal battle with the Recording Industry Association of America over access to millions of Internet account holders who download music. The industry group argues it requires only a subpoena from a U.S. federal court clerk to gain access to the accounts. Verizon argues that is too easy and is open to abuse. But so far, the courts have sided with the trade group. Mary Kirwan, a lawyer with security specialists Kasten Chase Applied Research Ltd. in Mississauga, said the Loblaw and Verizon cases demonstrate a new trend in access to on-line accounts. Internet service providers and telephone companies "are faced on a global basis with a deluge of requests from law enforcement and independent watchdogs for the names of subscribers," she said. "Depending on [the companies'] particular bent and the jurisdiction, they either give it up quietly or they fight." Ms. Kirwan and Mr. Power noted that a new federal privacy law comes into effect in January that will require all companies to secure confidential information. "If it's really sensitive information, you better have damn good security," Mr. Power said. "If it's less sensitive, you better take care of it and don't leave it lying around in open files." He added that under the new law, "if you don't follow [security] benchmarks, you may be considered negligent and then could suffer damages." http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030606.waliant0606/BNStory/Technology/
