This is part five of a multi-part series reviewing Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation in practice since its introduction in 2014 and the beginnings of enforcement in 2015. Crosslinks will be added as new parts go up.
Part 1: Terminology
Part 4: Case File – Compu-Finder
Part 5: Case File Anthology, 2015-2016
Part 6: Case File – Blackstone Education
Part 7: Case File Anthology, 2017-2018
Part 8: Case File – Brian Conley/nCrowd
Part 9: Case File Anthology, 2019-2022
Core resources:
Enforcement Actions Table (CASL selected)
Following the Compu-Finder penalty levied in early 2015 (to be walked back in 2017), CASL goes on a tear, dropping AMPs left and right. 7 out of the 15 total AMPs issued under CASL come from these two years.
We’re going to set aside one of them as particularly relevant to my interests (education space), and zip through some of the others:
March 25, 2015:
$48,000 AMP levied against “Plentyoffish Media”, a dating site. I’m not sure why people would want to date folks who are plenty offish, but there y’go. There was no question about consent here — CEMs were only sent to registered subscribers — but with no evident, or a non-functional, unsubscribe mechanism. This, along with a compliance program, seems to have passed without any re-evaluation or follow-up.
Issued penalty: $48,000
Final penalty: $48,000
Total issued AMPs: $1,148,000
Total imposed AMPs/monetary penalties: $248,000
Differential: $900,000
June 29, 2015:
$150,000 AMP levied against Porter Airlines, a small carrier. CEMs were sent to people without Porter being able to furnish any proof of consent. Some messages were sent without contact information, and others without “clear and prominent” unsubscribe information. Again, this plus a compliance program seems to have landed with no further appeals or follow-up.
Issued penalty: $150,000
Final penalty: $150,000
Total issued AMPs: $1,298,000
Total imposed AMPs/monetary penalties: $598,000
Differential: $900,000
November 20, 2015:
$200,000 monetary compensation paid by Rogers Media, a telecommunications giant. There were flawed unsubscribe mechanisms in emails they were sending, some unsubscribe requests were not acted upon within 10 days, others did not have an unsubscribe address that was valid for a minimum of 60 days after the message was sent. This, with a compliance program, landed without appeals or follow-up. The financial penalty is framed as “monetary compensation” rather than an “administrative monetary penalty,” with no further explanation.
Issued penalty: $200,000
Final penalty: $200,000
Total issued AMPs: $1,498,000
Total imposed AMPs/monetary penalties: $798,000
Differential: $900,000
September 1, 2016:
$60,000 monetary compensation paid by Kellogg Canada Inc., a food company. It, or authorized third parties, sent email without consent. This, with a compliance program, landed without appeals or follow-up. The financial penalty is framed as “monetary compensation” rather than an “administrative monetary penalty,” with no further explanation.
Issued penalty: $60,000
Final penalty: $60,000
Total issued AMPs: $1,552,000
Total imposed AMPs/monetary penalties: $858,000
Differential: $900,000
October 10, 2016:
$50,000 AMP levied against Blackstone Learning, a seminars/training company.
We’re going to unpack this more in the next post, as I’m very interested in education-space developments here, but in a nutshell, lots of email without proof of consent. The notice of violation (which was issued on January 30, 2015, but doesn’t seem to be available online) sent to Blackstone set out an AMP of $640,000, but the decision lowered it to $50,000.
Issued penalty: $640,000
Final penalty: $50,000
Total issued AMPs: $2,192,000
Total imposed AMPs/monetary penalties: $908,000
Differential: $1,284,000
December 14, 2016:
$100,000 AMP issued against Brian Conley of Couch Commerce/nCrowd, an online deals website. We’ll discuss this in detail when we get to 2019 and the final CRTC decision. Note that the link above goes to the final 2019 decision — Enforcement action 9090-2015-00414 (the 2016 notice) isn’t available, and the CRTC’s table of decisions links to the 2019 CRTC decision rather than the enforcement action.
The timing here is important, for reasons we’ll get into in our 2017-18 anthology including Conley’s case.
We’ll be back to look more in depth at Blackstone, and then get back to reviewing other CASL decisions.