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The Supreme Court Law Review: Osgoode’s Annual Constitutional Cases Conference

Authors

Susan Magotiaux

Abstract

This article offers a review of recent Supreme Court of Canada search and seizure cases to demonstrate the challenges facing courts, lawyers and law enforcement in applying existing Charter jurisprudence to new technological landscapes. R. v. Vu; R. v. TELUS Communications Co.; R. v. Spencer; and R. v. Fearon highlight the difficulties in drawing boundaries of privacy in computers, mobile devices, “intercepts” and online activity. Our changing social understanding of privacy impacts the sphere of activity and information encompassed by section 8 of the Charter, but easy public and remote access to digital data make drawing lines impractical. The article explores issues of digital security, police search protocols for computer and cell phone evidence, old and new statutory tools for access to information and the role of third parties in information control and disclosure.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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