Amid intense public scrutiny of the contaminated former General Motors site in St. Catharines, including concerns about an offline filtration system meant to eliminate toxic chemicals from stormwater runoff, the property owner has ordered further lab testing on the northern portion of the 55-acre property, the City has shared.  In a post on the City […]

The federal privacy commissioner will investigate the proliferation of sexualized deepfakes created by artificial intelligence chatbot Grok and shared on X. “The use of personal information without consent to create deepfakes, including intimate images, is a growing phenomenon that poses serious risks to individuals’ fundamental right to privacy,” Philippe Dufresne said in a news release […]

DENVER (AP) — A Colorado appeals panel on Wednesday seemed skeptical that a judge could use former county clerk Tina Peters’ insistence on spreading election conspiracy theories as part of the reason to sentence her to nine years in prison for orchestrating a data breach of election equipment. The three-judge panel was dismissive of many […]

This is your Access and Privacy News Summary for January 15th, our first of 2026.  After the holiday break, there’s a lot to catch up on. Across Canada and internationally, we’re seeing familiar themes re-emerge: data breaches with unresolved accountability, governments struggling to balance security, privacy, and transparency, and growing pressure to define how artificial intelligence is governed, or not governed, in practice.  We’ll start in Nova […]

A former Winnipeg police officer who sold drugs to friends and colleagues and took a photo of a dead woman while on duty apologized for “tarnishing” the reputation of the service at his sentencing hearing Tuesday.  Elston Bostock, 49, earlier pleaded guilty to charges including breach of trust, attempting to obstruct justice, drug trafficking and […]

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that starting Feb. 1 he will deny federal funding to any states that are home to local governments resisting his administration’s immigration policies, expanding on previous threats to cut off resources to the so-called sanctuary cities themselves. Such an action could have far-reaching impacts across the U.S., potentially even in […]

The Manitoba government has shelved plans to organize teacher exchanges to address workforce shortages and give urban and northern professionals an opportunity to learn from one another. The now-defunct teacher interchange committee was created to bring together bureaucrats, school leaders from Winnipeg and northern Manitoba and representatives from Gakino’amaage: Teach for Canada in 2024-25. Gakino’amaage, […]

Domestic violence charges in Nunavut have been leading to fewer and fewer guilty verdicts, with 2023 seeing the lowest number of intimate partner violence convictions since 2011, Statistics Canada data shows. Only 29 per cent of domestic violence cases in the territory resulted in a guilty verdict in 2023, the most recent year for available […]

The Manitoba government is launching a new app to let people store their health cards, and eventually other government documents, on their smartphones or tablets. The Manitoba Digital Wallet is aimed at operating like Apple or Google digital wallets that come with mobile devices, except it will be issued by the Manitoba government. Premier Wab […]

Canada and the United States say two preclearance projects that would allow more travellers to be screened well in advance of crossing the border are set to proceed this year after many months of planning. The assurances follow U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra’s comments that cast doubt on the future of arrangements currently allowing […]

Prediction markets let people wager on anything from a basketball game to the outcome of a presidential election — and recently, the downfall of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. The latter is drawing renewed scrutiny into this murky world of speculative, 24/7 transactions. Last week, an anonymous trader pocketed more than $400,000 after betting that […]

The fallout continues at Memorial University, where the institution’s first vice provost of equity, diversity, inclusion and anti-racism  (EDI-AR) has left the role before the end of the five-year term. Memorial University Students’ Union (MUNSU) Director of Campaigns  Rana Abuidris says the departure of Delores Mullings and the broad  claims Mullings laid out in an […]