Canada Civil Liberties Group Argues Toronto Shouldn't Be 'Google's Lab Rat' (fastcompany.com) 36
"A civil liberties group in Canada is suing three tiers of government over potential privacy issues posed by Sidewalk Labs's plan to develop a 12-acre smart city in Toronto, which will be approved or denied later this summer," reports Fast Company.
The fight centers around a taxpayer-funded organization jointly created by the federal, provincial, and municipal governments: The Canadian Civil Liberties Association claims that Waterfront Toronto, let alone Sidewalk Labs, doesn't have the jurisdiction to make rules about people's privacy. The government "sold out our constitutional rights to freedom from surveillance and sold it to the global surveillance mammoth of behavioral data collection: Google," said Michael Bryant, the executive director and general counsel of the CCLA, in a press conference.... "Our job at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association is to say to all three levels of government that Canadians should not be Google's lab rat. This lab needs to be shut down and reset...."
Ann Cavoukian, the former Information and Privacy Commissioner for the Canadian province of Ontario who joined the project early, quit in October 2018. The reason? Sidewalk Labs had decided not to require that all data collected by third parties in the development be instantly de-identified at the source, which would mean that sensitive data like people's faces or license plates could still potentially be used for corporate profit. "I knew the smart city of privacy wasn't going to happen," she says. "That's why I resigned: I said, I can't go along with it...."
"If I was still involved, I'd want more decentralized models of data where the individual could truly retain control of the data," she says, citing a new, privacy-centric model from the web's father, Tim Berners-Lee, to decentralize the web and take back control from the corporations that run it.
In a statement Sidewalk Labs said they favor a data trust run by an independent third party partnering with the government to benefit the community and "spur innovation and investment" while protecting privacy. "Sidewalk Labs fully supports a robust and healthy discussion regarding privacy, data ownership, and governance. But this debate must be rooted in fact, not fiction and fear-mongering."
But the CCLA's web site argues that unlawful surveillance "is wrong whether done by data profiteers or the state." The article also quotes their general counsel's complaint that the government has "outsourced our privacy rights and the supervision of our privacy rights and our surveillance to the very company that's doing the surveillance."
The fight centers around a taxpayer-funded organization jointly created by the federal, provincial, and municipal governments: The Canadian Civil Liberties Association claims that Waterfront Toronto, let alone Sidewalk Labs, doesn't have the jurisdiction to make rules about people's privacy. The government "sold out our constitutional rights to freedom from surveillance and sold it to the global surveillance mammoth of behavioral data collection: Google," said Michael Bryant, the executive director and general counsel of the CCLA, in a press conference.... "Our job at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association is to say to all three levels of government that Canadians should not be Google's lab rat. This lab needs to be shut down and reset...."
Ann Cavoukian, the former Information and Privacy Commissioner for the Canadian province of Ontario who joined the project early, quit in October 2018. The reason? Sidewalk Labs had decided not to require that all data collected by third parties in the development be instantly de-identified at the source, which would mean that sensitive data like people's faces or license plates could still potentially be used for corporate profit. "I knew the smart city of privacy wasn't going to happen," she says. "That's why I resigned: I said, I can't go along with it...."
"If I was still involved, I'd want more decentralized models of data where the individual could truly retain control of the data," she says, citing a new, privacy-centric model from the web's father, Tim Berners-Lee, to decentralize the web and take back control from the corporations that run it.
In a statement Sidewalk Labs said they favor a data trust run by an independent third party partnering with the government to benefit the community and "spur innovation and investment" while protecting privacy. "Sidewalk Labs fully supports a robust and healthy discussion regarding privacy, data ownership, and governance. But this debate must be rooted in fact, not fiction and fear-mongering."
But the CCLA's web site argues that unlawful surveillance "is wrong whether done by data profiteers or the state." The article also quotes their general counsel's complaint that the government has "outsourced our privacy rights and the supervision of our privacy rights and our surveillance to the very company that's doing the surveillance."
Constitutional right to freedom from surveillance (Score:5, Interesting)
Is that actually a thing? Would that make things like speed cameras, CCTV systems, logging passports that enter and leave, registering your ownership of land / companies, and other such basic "surveillance" systems illegal?
Re:Constitutional right to freedom from surveillan (Score:5, Informative)
It's not actually a thing. Canada has generally strong privacy laws though, which non-anonymized data collection could easily fall afoul of.
Re: Constitutional right to freedom from surveilla (Score:1, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
> Its head of state is a monarch. Yes, really. She's on their money if you don't believe me.
Not only that, The Governor General of Canada is the federal viceregal representative of the Canadian monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II declared both by the Constitution Act, 1867 (previously the British North America Act, 1867) and the letters patent issued in 1947 by King George VI. (Paraphrased from Governor General of Canada [wikipedia.org])
Re: (Score:1)
"head of state is a monarch." means nothing in Canada it just figuratively, he/she has no governing powers. Big deal she's on the money, again means nothing. The crown does not rule Canada.
Re: (Score:2)
Um, Canada is a constitutional monarchy, which you could have established by glancing at the inset summary on the Wikipedia page. Being a constitutional monarchy, the constitution is somewhat important.
Re: (Score:2)
The privacy laws are what matter at the end of the road, and how the courts actually rule on it. Speed and red light cameras don't apply because the person doesn't get the ticket, the vehicle does. CCTV doens't have the huge backstop that it does in the UK, businesses in turn have the right to ensure their property is protected and can legally film an area that's semi-public(entry from public to their property), and the right to film anyone in a public area is unrestricted. Passports are logged and ente
Good Stop it before it starts (Score:2)
The last thing anyone should want is Google to have a lab to refine their techniques of manipulation.
Pipe dream (Score:2)
Re:Pipe dream (Score:5, Insightful)
“The data” shouldn’t be collected in the first place. We shouldn’t have to argue over who should own it.
But you're still cool with Google censoring, right (Score:5, Insightful)
To protect the freedom of Canadians, we must ensure they respect our privacy rights...and also demand that they censor any content that the liberal majority disagrees with!
Freedom, liberty, and censorship for all!
Re: (Score:1)
Are you seriously unaware of the history here? You don't remember when the ACLU defended Nazis who wanted to march in Skokie? Or more recently when they defended Milo Yiannopoulos' right to advertise on the DC subways? Human beings are never going to fit into any neat and tidy political classification system.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, civil liberties groups are well known for their censorship advocacy. /s
The ACLU has been pushing pro-censorship advocacy for the better part of 5 years now, and have openly stated that they will no longer defend offensive(and legal speech) especially if it triggers some whining leftist. And on top of that the ACLU hasn't really ever done anything in Canada, we have different groups that deal with civil, citizen, and protected rights.
Nobody should be anybody's lab rats! (Score:2)
So tired of defending my systems against FB type attacks.
Worse than you think (Score:1)
Google wanted the property taxes too. Fuck corporations.
Re: You are an idiot. (Score:1)
I am so glad no one bothered to try debating you. The only thing worth doing is noting your idiocy.
Mission accomplished.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't worry, Goog will find other victims (Score:1)
to exploit. As Barnum said, there's a sucker born every minute. Trouble is, your idiot nephew Doug will cough up data on the whole family in exchange for a new ringtone, and you will never get your data back while megacorp monetizes it.