Police handcuff man trying to enter Drake's Toronto mansion
Toronto police say a man was taken into custody outside Drake's Bridle Path mansion Wednesday afternoon after he tried to gain access to the residence.
The Tim Hortons mobile ordering app violated the law by collecting vast amounts of location information from customers, an investigation by federal and provincial privacy watchdogs has found.
In a report released Wednesday, privacy commissioners say people who downloaded the Tim Hortons app had their movements tracked and recorded every few minutes, even when the app was not open on their phones.
The investigation came after National Post reporter James McLeod obtained data showing the Tim Hortons app on his phone had tracked his location more than 2,700 times in less than five months.
Federal privacy commissioner Daniel Therrien did the probe with privacy commissioners from British Columbia, Quebec and Alberta.
"Our joint investigation tells yet another troubling story of a company that failed to ensure proper design of an intrusive technology, resulting in a mass invasion of Canadians' privacy," Therrien said.
"It also highlights the very real risks related to location data and the tracking of individuals."
The commissioners found the Tim Hortons app asked for permission to access a mobile device's geolocation functions, but misled many users to believe information would be accessed only when the app was in use.
However, the app tracked users as long as the device was on, continually gathering their location data.
The commissioners say Tim Hortons collected "vast amounts" of granular location data with the aim of delivering targeted advertising, to better promote its coffee and associated products, but that it never actually used the data for this purpose.
The app used location data to infer where users lived, where they worked and whether they were travelling, the watchdogs found.
It generated an "event" every time users entered or left a Tim Hortons competitor, a major sports venue or their home or workplace, the commissioners said in a joint news release.
"The investigation uncovered that Tim Hortons continued to collect location data for a year after shelving plans to use it for targeted advertising, even though it had no legitimate need to do so," the statement said.
"The company says it only used aggregated location data in a limited way, to analyze user trends -- for example, whether users switched to other coffee chains, and how users' movements changed as the pandemic took hold."
While Tim Hortons stopped continually tracking users' locations in 2020, after the probe was launched, this did not eliminate the risk of surveillance, the watchdogs say.
The investigation found that Tim Hortons' contract with a U.S. third-party location services supplier contained language so "vague and permissive" that it would have allowed the company to sell "de-identified" location data for its own purposes.
There is a real risk that such geolocation data could be "re-identified," the watchdogs warned.
"Geolocation data is incredibly sensitive because it paints such a detailed and revealing picture of our lives," Therrien said.
Surveillance of our everyday movements reveals where people live and work, as well as information about visits to a medical clinic or place of worship, he added.
"It can be used to make deductions about sexual preferences, social political affiliations and much more."
Tim Hortons agreed to implement recommendations that the company:
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 1, 2022
Toronto police say a man was taken into custody outside Drake's Bridle Path mansion Wednesday afternoon after he tried to gain access to the residence.
Ontario Provincial Police say 64 suspects are facing a combined 348 charges in connection with a series of child sexual exploitation investigations that spanned the province.
Independent U.S. presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had a parasite in his head more than a decade ago, but has fully recovered, his campaign said, after the New York Times reported about the ailment.
Canadians looking to grow their families with the assistance of sperm or egg donations should soon have more options for donors as the federal health agency does away with longstanding restrictions criticized as discriminatory.
A Saskatchewan boy who qualified for an international braille competition in Los Angeles next month hopes he can inspire change in his home province.
There is currently a whooping cough epidemic in Europe, with 10 times as many cases compared to the previous two years. While an outbreak has not been declared nationwide in Canada, whooping cough is regularly detected in the country.
Pfizer has agreed to settle more than 10,000 lawsuits about cancer risks related to the now discontinued heartburn drug Zantac, Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the deal.
Steve Albini, an alternative rock pioneer and legendary producer who shaped the musical landscape through his work with Nirvana, the Pixies, PJ Harvey and more, has died. He was 61.
Quebec Premier Francois Legault is defending his comments about a new history museum after he was accused by a prominent First Nations group of trying to erase their history.
The stakes have been set for a bet between Vancouver and Edmonton's mayors on who will win Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
A grieving mother is hosting a helmet drive in the hopes of protecting children on Manitoba First Nations from a similar tragedy that killed her daughter.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.