Does an Individual have a Reasonable Expectation of Privacy in his/her Municipal Address?
Section 8 of the Charter guarantees “the right to be secure against unreasonable search or seizure.” This right contains internal limits: its scope is limited to circumstances in which there is a reasonable expectation of privacy. Hunter v. Southam , 1984 CanLII 33 (SCC), [1984] 2 S.C.R. 145 , at p. 159 . The factors that inform the analysis of whether there is a reasonable expectation of privacy have been grouped under four broad headings: (1) the subject matter of the alleged search; (2) the claimant’s interest in the subject matter; (3) the claimant’s subjective expectation of privacy in the subject matter; and (4) whether this subjective expectation of privacy was objectively reasonable, having regard to the totality of the circumstances: R. v. Spencer , 2014 SCC 43 (CanLII), [2014] 2 S.C.R. 212 , at para. 18 . In the informational context, s.8 of the Charter protects “a biographical core” of personal information that “tends to reveal intimate details of the life...