Facebook hits deadline on privacy in Canada

A month ago, the Canadian Privacy Commissioner issued a report that found some Facebook practices violate the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Today is the deadline for Facebook to respond to the report.

The Facebook investigation was prompted by a complaint filed by the the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC)  at the University of Ottawa law school. Several main issues were raised in Privacy Commissioner's report, the most glaring of which is the access to personal information on Facebook by some third-party applications. In order to download popular games and quizzes, Facebook users must consent to share all their personal information, except their contact details. These companies, totalling nearly one million, operate in 180 countries. Other serious problems include account deactivation and deletion, accounts of deceased users, and non-users’ personal information.

If Facebook's final response is unsatisfactory, the Privacy Commissioner  has two weeks to take the California-based company to Federal Court in Ottawa to try and get a court order requiring it to change its business practices to comply with Canada's  privacy law.

If the dispute goes to court it would be an international first for Facebook, which has grown to more than 200 million users since its launch in 2004.