Legislation will fight crime

Re: Lawful access returns under the cover of cyber-bullying Bill, Nov. 26.

Michael Geist’s column focused on the Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act contains some serious misconceptions.

Our legislation aims to provide police with the means to fight crime in today’s high-tech environment while maintaining the judicial checks and balances needed to protect Canadians’ privacy. Under our proposals, police are required to seek judicial authorization, a warrant, before seeking data related to online crimes. The proposed legislation maintains the current approach to legal thresholds and judicial authorities for investigative tools

This week the Privacy Commissioner of Canada came out in support of our approach.

Our Bill proposes one new offence to be added to the Criminal Code: the non-consensual distribution of intimate images. This Bill is not creating additional offences such as the criminalization of software that allows for the stealing of cable. In fact, the Criminal Code already designates stealing cable as a criminal offence, and Courts have found that software can be considered a device to facilitate this theft.

It would not make sense to introduce the one new offence we propose without making the amendments needed to provide police with the necessary tools to investigate this type of online crime. In fact a July 2013 report written by Federal-Provincial-Territorial officials recommended both the creation of this new offence and modernizing of the Criminal Code at the same time. It is worth noting that some of the criminal laws surrounding computer crime have not been updated since the 1990s.

Our government has pledged to keep Canadians families safe and this legislation is one way we are fulfilling that promise.

PETER MACKAY, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada