A tribunal ruling in British Columbia suggests international internet companies can’t be forced to delete intimate images under provincial legislation designed to protect people from having such pictures shared without their consent.
British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal ruled on Monday that it can’t penalize social media platform X for not deleting an intimate image of a complainant shared online against her will, and that “geoblocking” the image from being seen in Canada instead reasonably addressed its unlawful distribution.
The case stemmed from a March 2025 protection order issued under British Columbia’s Intimate Images Protection Act (IIPA) that X delete the intimate image shared on its platform.
The tribunal then ruled in September 2025 that X must pay a $100,000 penalty for not deleting the image, but the social media platform challenged that decision, saying the tribunal could not order it to do any more than geoblock the image, which it had done.
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Tribunal vice-chair Eric Regehr said in the latest decision that he was reversing the fine, and that X had a valid defence under a section of the intimate images law that states an internet company is not liable if it “has taken reasonable steps to address the unlawful distribution.”
“X argues that geoblocking images that contravene the IIPA reasonably addresses the distribution of intimate images on its platform because it is a global platform subject to many different legal regimes about what people are allowed to post,” he said.
“Put another way, X argues that geoblocking is reasonable because globally enforcing a B.C. law about what is allowed to be posted online would violate the comity of nations,” he added.
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Regehr said that comity — the idea of mutual respect among nations — “may operate to limit a law’s application outside Canada. “
His ruling cited the “compelling” reasoning in an Australian case from 2024, although he said it was not a binding authority.
“The court concluded that such an order would, in effect, govern a foreign corporation’s operations in a foreign country, and would intrude on a foreign corporation’s contractual relationships with people all over the world,” he said.
Regehr rejected X’s request that the complainant be ordered to pay its legal fees in excess of $100,000 US. The company is owned by Elon Musk, the world’s richest person, with a net worth estimated at $900 billion US by Forbes’ real-time billionaires list.
“I find that it would have a potential chilling effect if applicants had to accept substantial financial risk when deciding whether to try to enforce protection orders against internet intermediaries,” Regher said.
The complainant, whose name is under a publication ban, represented herself.
British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal says it is Canada’s first online tribunal, which offers an accessible, affordable way to resolve many civil disputes without a lawyer, and without a courtroom.
The legislation at the heart of the case was tabled by the NDP government in 2023, partly in response to the 2012 suicide of teenager Amanda Todd, who faced cyberbullying and online sexual exploitation.
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Outgoing attorney general Niki Sharma said at the time that the sharing of intimate images without consent “is a betrayal that can have devastating impacts” in promising redress.
“Victims are often too ashamed to come forward and those who do are met with limited, complex and expensive legal options,” she said at the time. “We are building a path to justice for people to regain control of their private images and hold perpetrators to account.”
Sharma could not be immediately reached for comment. The NDP lost last month’s provincial election, although Sharma retained her riding.
