Ushering in a New Era: Assessing the Reasonable Expectation of Privacy vis-à- vis Cryptocurrency and Blockchain Data

Abstract

In recent years, the technology of cryptocurrency has become increasingly mainstream and has been documented as playing a role in the commission of contemporary criminal activity. The law must be responsive to these new techniques for committing crimes and adapt accordingly. Currently, there is a dearth of both jurisprudence and literature as it relates to section 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the search and seizure of cryptocurrency by law enforcement. For the protections of section 8 to apply, there must be a reasonable expectation of privacy in the matter searched or seized by authorities. This paper analyzes the reasonable expectation of privacy as it relates to cryptocurrency in three different ways: first, in cryptocurrency transaction data on the blockchain, which is a public ledger that records cryptocurrency transactions; second, in various types of cryptocurrency storage mediums; and third, in user information on cryptocurrency exchanges. Previous section 8 Charter jurisprudence, U.S. case law, secondary sources, and blockchain data were all utilized to guide these analyses. Applying the reasonable expectation of privacy test to these inquiries yielded three distinct findings. It was determined that there is no reasonable expectation of privacy in cryptocurrency transaction data on the blockchain, that there is a reasonable expectation of privacy in various types of cryptocurrency storage mediums, and that there is a reasonable but diminished expectation of privacy in user information on cryptocurrency exchanges.