South of the border, U.S. president Donald Trump is facing a barrage of mockery for the fact that his proposed border wall is “a 1st-century solution to a 21st-century problem.” Perhaps we shouldn’t be so quick to judge, given the way our own government struggles to implement technology. On Tuesday, Catherine Tully, Nova Scotia’s information […]
Privacy
Posted inNews + Opinion
How “snooping” harms us all
By now, you’ve probably heard about the Sobeys pharmacy manager who found herself in hot water after using a provincial drug database to “snoop” on the medical information of friends, relatives and even her child’s girlfriend. This is just the latest embarrassing privacy failure for the Nova Scotia government, following on from two personal data […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Sobeys pharmacist spied on, shared private medical records
A Sobeys pharmacist “snooped” on the confidential medical history of friends, family and coworkers over a two year period and the province failed to adequately look into the serious privacy breach. Those shocking details are contained in two new investigations released Wednesday by Nova Scotia’s Information and Privacy Commissioner. According to Catherine Tully’s office, from […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
The FOIPOP breach and the dangers of criminalizing research
Last December, two journalists in Myanmar, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, were invited to dinner by police officers to discuss their research into war crimes carried out by the military. The officers handed them some documents, then immediately arrested them under the country’s Official Secrets Act for possessing the classified material. As absurd as […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Province was warned about sloppy database security over a year ago
The government’s cozy and “highly-dependent” relationship with systems service provider Unisys opened up some big holes in Nova Scotia’s IT security. So says a damning auditor general report from 2016 conducted on the same database system used for Nova Scotia’s recently breached Freedom of Information web portal. The purpose of the audit was to investigate […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Province just sort of stumbles across massive data breach
With minimal effort, it appears a Halifax teenager was able to download 7,000 confidential documents containing personal information on thousands of Nova Scotians—and the government only found out about it by accident. At a press conference Wednesday, deputy minister of Internal Services Jeff Conrad described how an unauthorized user had—over two days in March—accessed private […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Protest potpourri scheduled for Province House
Nova Scotians are spoiled for choice when it comes to protesting their government. In what’s practically become an annual tradition, this week hundreds of people will once again gather outside Province House demanding change and voicing their opposition to a growing portfolio of disappointments. The Nova Scotians Rise Up event—scheduled for noon on the 27—will […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Legal experts closely watching Michael Kydd’s Twitter lawsuit
[Image-1] A lawsuit filed by Michael Kydd is being closely watched by the legal community, but it could also have a huge impact on social media platforms and how we use them. Rob Currie, professor at Dalhousie’s School of Law and director of its Law and Technology Institute, says it’s a “cutting edge” case. “Electronic […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Street checks by Halifax police are unacceptable says privacy lawyer
[Image-1] David Fraser doesn’t remember the last time he was stopped by police. But he knows it happens disproportionately to other people, and that’s a problem. “I’m a middle-aged white guy,” says Fraser, a privacy lawyer with McInnes Cooper. “If I get stopped by the cops at night, I have way more confidence that I’m […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Nova Scotia still missing key privacy protections says report
[Image-1]
 Nova Scotia’s information and privacy commissioner says the province needs a statutory duty to report breaches of individual privacy. Commissioner Catherine Tully published on Tuesday her office’s annual report on Nova Scotia’s access to information and protection of privacy laws. It found that personal information held by public bodies was “likely breached between 10 […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Laura Doucette awarded $54,640 in damages after being defamed by officer
[Image-1] A decision released today by Justice Denise Boudreau awards $52,640 in damages to Laura Doucette, the Nova Scotian woman who was defamed by Department of Justice investigator David Grimes in 2012. 
 As we’ve previously reported, Grimes was the officer assigned to evaluate Doucette for a firearms license so she could complete the Correctional […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
How the province defamed Laura Doucette
[Image-1] Laura Doucette stands facing the wall of windows that dominates the Supreme Court room at Summit Place. Outside, a massive Canadian flag snaps in the wind and the Woodside ferry crosses the harbour. It’s hard to tell if she’s looking at either or simply trying not to think about the fact that the man […]
