It’s mid-October. Like many businesses in Canada, you may be weary of hearing about CASL compliance. Hopefully that weariness is due to all the hard work you did 3 months ago to bring your organization into compliance for the July 1st start-date.

If you’re a software vendor, then you should gird yourself for round two: Yes, there are additional provisions in CASL which deal with the installation of software, and those rules come on stream in 3 months on January 15, 2015.

Section 8 of CASL ostensibly deals with spyware and malware. Hackers are not the only problem; think of the Sony Rootkit case (See our earlier post here) as another example of the kind of thing that this law was designed to address.

This is the essence of Section 8: “A person must not, in the course of a commercial activity, install …a computer program on any other person’s computer system… unless the person has obtained the express consent of the owner …” This applies only if the computer system is located in Canada, or if the person either is in Canada at the relevant time or is acting under the direction of a person who is in Canada at the time when they give the directions.

This relatively simple idea - get consent if you want to install an application on someone else’s system in Canada - has far-reaching implications due to the way the legislation draws the definitions of “computer program” and “computer system” from the Criminal Code. As you can guess, the Criminal Code definitions are extremely broad. So, what does this mean in real life?

  • Certain types of specified programs require “enhanced disclosure” by the software vendor. (I am saying ’software vendors’ as those are the entities most likely to bring themselves into compliance. Of course, hackers and organized crime syndicates should also take note of the enhanced disclosure requirements);
  • Express consent, under this law, means that the consent must be requestedclearly and simply, and the purpose of the consent must be described;
  • The software vendor requesting consent must describe the function andpurpose of the computer program that is to be installed;
  • The software vendor requesting consent must provide an electronic address so that the user can request, within a period of one year, that the program be removed or disabled;
  • Note that if a computer program is installed before January 15, 2015, then the person’s consent is implied. This implied consent lasts until the user gives notice that they don’t want the installation anymore. Or until January 15, 2018, whichever comes first. I’m not making this stuff up, that’s what the Act says.
  • One more thing: Enhanced disclosure does not apply if the computer program only collects, uses or communicates “transmission data”. Transmission data is what you might call envelope information. The Act defines it as data that deals with “dialling, routing, addressing or signalling” and although it might show info like “type, direction, date, time, duration, size, origin, destination or termination of the communication”, it does not reveal “the substance, meaning or purpose of the communication”. So there is effectively a carve-out for the tracking of this category info.

Don’t worry, Canadian anti-spam laws are kind of like Lord of the Rings: Sequels will keep coming whether you like it or not. Once we’re past January 15, 2015, you can look forward to July 1, 2017, which is the day on which sections 47 to 51, 55 of CASL come into force. These provisions institute a private right of action for any breach of the Act.

If you are a software vendor selling in Canada, get advice on the implications for automatic installs and updates, whether this is for business-to-business, business-to-consumer, or mobile apps. There are already more than 1,000 complaints under the anti-spam provisions of the law. You don’t want to be the test case for the computer program provisions.