The Supreme Court of Canada is about to decide if clicking “I agree” actually means you read or understood a single word of the terms and conditions.
What happened: Canada’s highest court has agreed to hear a case about whether Facebook (now Meta) violated federal privacy law by not properly informing users that their data, and their friends’ data, could be scooped up by a third party and sold off.
- The crux of the case is whether or not users agreeing to Facebook’s lengthy privacy policy counted as “meaningful consent.”
Catch-up: The Federal Court originally sided with Facebook in 2023, saying users technically gave consent by agreeing to the company’s privacy policy. But last fall, the Federal Court of Appeal reversed that decision, calling the assumption that anyone reads the entire terms and conditions “dubious.”
Why it matters: The Supreme Court case could establish new ground rules when it comes to signing away your personal info online. If the court rules against Meta, agreeing to those jargon-filled 5,000-word privacy policies may no longer count as real consent.
Big picture: If you need proof that nobody reads the fine print, one experiment found that out of 543 university students who signed up for a fake social media platform, all of them agreed to the terms of conditions, including a clause giving up the rights to their firstborn child.—LA