Can Canadian Courts Issue Site-Blocking Orders? Prior to last Friday, it would have been unprecedented. With the Federal Court’s decision in Bell Media Inc v GoldTV Services (2019 FC 1432), that is no longer the case.

Although it is a single trial court decision, owners of Canadian copyrights and their lawyers now have an affirmative answer and even a test to apply to the issue.

The case relates to two websites, GoldTV.biz and GoldTV.ca, which offered an unauthorized subscription service allowing users to stream copyrighted content. The copyright owners and exclusive licensees (Rogers Media Inc., Groupe TVA Inc. and Bell Media Inc.) objected to this, alleging infringement.

Conspicuous by his, her, or their absence were John Doe 1 and John Doe 2, the respective operators of the sites. Despite the plaintiff’s diligent efforts, identifying these entities proved impossible, with the judges in earlier stages of the proceedings commenting that this was likely due to “obvious efforts to remain anonymous and avoid legal action by rights holders…”

Caught in between were the nation’s internet service providers (ISPs). Indeed, in the absence of the defendant and faced with ongoing infringement of their rights, the plaintiffs sought site-blocking orders against eleven major ISPs. Of these, four consented to the order and four took no position. Distributel and Cogeco sought to vary the language of the order, and only TekSavvy opposed the order on the merits.