CRTC Archives - Barry Sookman

Fact checking Michael Geist’s criticisms of the FairPlay site blocking proposal

The FairPlay coalition comprising more than 25 organizations representing hundreds of thousands of members of Canada’s creative community made a reasonable proposal to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), Canada’s telecommunications and broadcast regulator, to address the scourge of online copyright infringement.[1] The proposal, which involves website blocking, was immediately attacked by anti-copyright activist Michael Geist (“Geist”) in a series of articles and interviews. As I showed in a prior lengthy blog post,[2] his criticisms were unfounded and overblown.…

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Has the CRTC compromised its judicial independence on CASL?

Philip Palmer, a former specialist practitioner at Industry Canada Legal Services and the person who oversaw the development of CASL and its regulations, just published an important blog post, CRTC CASL Guidelines: Do they Compromise Adjudicative Independence? In the post, he questions whether the CRTC should be publishing enforcement guidelines in the name of the Commission in view of the important adjudicative role that the Commission also has in enforcing CASL.

In part, he says the following:

As the guidelines deal with a matter that is central to the CASL scheme (express consent to receive commercial electronic messages), and one in which there are possible arguments to be made in favour of industry practices (PIPEDA, for instance, specifically recognises a pre-ticked box as a real consent).

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CRTC guidance on interpreting its CASL regulations and guidelines at the IT-Can/TCLG meeting

Lynne Perrault, and Ryan Caron of the CRTC gave a talk to members of IT-Can and the Toronto Computer Lawyers Group on the CRTC regulations and guidelines related to CASL. Kelly Anne Smith of the CRTC joined by phone. (I summarized these documents in a blog post, CRTC Issues CASL (Canada’s Anti-Spam Law) Guidelines, background and commentary.) The slides presented at the meeting are set out below.

The following are some highlights from the talk and the Q & A that followed.…

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CRTC clarifies questions about CASL

Earlier today, Andrea Rosen, Chief Compliance and Enforcement Officer at the CRTC and Lynne Perrault, Director – Electronic Commerce Enforcement Division, Compliance and Enforcement Sector of the CRTC, gave a talk to the ITAC Legal Affairs Forum in Toronto. The subject was the Commission’s plans for enforcement of CASL. Ryan Caron, manager of e-commerce enforcement from the CRTC participated by phone.

The following are some highlights from the talk.

The CRTC has hired staff and has the capability to engage in computer forensics and cyber investigations.

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Value for signal case in Supreme Court today

This morning, the Supreme Court of Canada will begin hearing an appeal from the decision of the Federal Court of Appeal in the so called “value for signal” case. The Court of Appeal, in a split decision, ruled that the Broadcasting Act empowers the CRTC to establish a regime to enable private local television stations to choose to negotiate with broadcasting distribution undertakings a fair value in exchange for the distribution of the programming services broadcast by those local television stations.…

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CRTC finalizes CASL regulations

On March 5, 2012 the CRTC finalized its set of regulations for Canada’s new anti-spam bill, CASL. These regulations were revised following extensive consultations held separately by the CRTC and Industry Canada on previously published regulations. These consultations resulted in extensive recommendations for changes by more than 57 organisations.

Industry Canada is still considering what changes to make to its draft regulations. Unlike the CRTC, it intends to publish a new set of draft regulations, possibly next month, for comment before finalizing them.…

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CRTC

Supreme Court to hear whether ISPs are broadcasting undertakings

Later this morning the Supreme Court will hear arguments in the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television & Radio Artists, et al. v. Bell Aliant Regional Communications, LP, et al. case. The central issue in the case is whether the Federal Court of Appeal erred in holding that retail ISPs are not broadcasting undertakings subject to regulation by the CRTC when they provide access through the Internet to broadcasting requested by end users.

The decision of the Federal Court of Appeal being appealed from is Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (Re), 2010 FCA 178.…

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CRTC

Supreme Court to hear “value for signal” appeal

The Supreme Court of Canada granted leave this morning to Cogego and other telcos to appeal the “value for signal” decision of the Federal Court of Appeal. The question in the case is whether the CRTC has the jurisdiction, under its mandate under the Broadcasting Act to establish a system allowing private local television stations to choose to negotiate with broadcasting distribution companies a fair value in exchange distribution of programming services distributed by the local television stations?

The Supreme Court has summarized the case as follows:

The regime to which this question refers is sometimes called the “value for signal” regime, which would permit a private local television station to negotiate with cable television service providers (“broadcast distribution undertakings” or “BDUs”) for an arrangement under which the BDUs provide consideration to the television station for the right to retransmit its signals.

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