Canadian police forces have been using drones for many years, but scrutiny of their use is lacking, especially as the technology has evolved, privacy and surveillance researchers say.  Their concerns come after Vancouver’s Chief Const. Adam Palmer revealed that investigators deployed drones to locate a suspect in a pair of gruesome stranger attacks in the […]

Russian commentators on Thursday mocked allegations that Moscow was meddling again in the U.S. presidential election, and President Vladimir Putin appeared to bolster the teasing tone by wryly claiming he supported Vice President Kamala Harris. On Wednesday, the U.S. Justice Department said the Russian state-owned broadcaster RT is carrying out a covert campaign to influence […]

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The Nevada Supreme Court on Thursday ended a defamation lawsuit brought by casino mogul Steve Wynn against The Associated Press in 2018, rejecting his bid for a jury to hear his claim that he was defamed by an AP story about two women who alleged Wynn committed sexual misconduct. The seven-member […]

Twenty-eight months after a Freedom of Information  request was submitted to the City of St. Catharines, officials have yet to release crucial reports detailing the presence of chemicals on the former GM site along Ontario Street that the previous mayor pushed to get developed behind the scenes.   These reports, Phase I and II Environmental Site […]

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — In competing developments about reproductive rights in the nation’s largest state, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed a bill to expand birth control access while a judge struck down decades-old restrictions on who could perform abortions. The Republican governor’s veto Wednesday stunned supporters of the measure, which would have forced insurance companies […]

BALTIMORE (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department has widened its indictment of Russians in the so-called WhisperGate malware attacks aimed at destroying computer systems in Ukraine and 26 NATO allies including the United States. A superseding indictment announced Thursday names five Russian military intelligence officers in a conspiracy to demoralize the Ukrainian people on the […]

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Seattle woman pleaded guilty Thursday to attempting to bribe a Minnesota juror with a bag of $120,000 in cash in exchange for an acquittal in one of the country’s largest COVID-19-related fraud cases. Ladan Mohamed Ali, 31, dropped off a cash bribe in a plan that involved tracking a juror to […]

With elections coming up from coast-to-coast, the BC Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) is pleased to release a new section of its online help topics, Your Political Privacy. This resource provides a guide for individuals and groups to better understand and exercise control over their personal information during an election.  The right to […]

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — An Alaska judge struck down Wednesday a decades-old state law that restricted who could perform abortions in the state. The decision comes out of a 2019 lawsuit brought by Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, which challenged the law that says only a doctor licensed by the State Medical […]

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A former state employee who said he leaked information about the plans to build golf courses and hotels in Florida’s state parks has apparently been fired. But James Gaddis, who described himself as an “ethical whistleblower,” said he doesn’t regret making the public aware of the proposals, according to the Palm […]

Budget and staff challenges have left overworked employees exhausted and sapped morale at the federal nerve centre for managing forest fires and other national emergencies, an internal memo reveals. The Public Safety Canada document also says the Government Operations Centre lacks both the capacity to fully modernize and the money for new digital tools.  The […]

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Dutch data protection watchdog on Tuesday issued facial recognition startup Clearview AI with a fine of 30.5 million euros ($33.7 million) over its creation of what the agency called an “illegal database” of billion of photos of faces. The Netherlands’ Data Protection Agency, or DPA, also warned Dutch companies […]