Sim & McBurney | Sim Lowman Ashton & McKay LLP

Sim, Lowman, Ashton & McKay LLP is a law firm that specializes in Intellectual Property and related technology law. Sim & McBurney is a Patent and Trade-mark Agency firm that specializes in Patent and Trade-mark prosecution.

Both firms recognize the importance of confidentiality and the sensitivity of all documents and other information that we receive from you in the context of representing your interests. We have always been and continue to be committed to taking all reasonable steps to protect the confidentiality of that information.

From January 1, 2004, all businesses engaged in commercial activities must comply with the Personal Information Protection and Electronics Documents Act, which provides for specific protection of an individuals personal information. These obligations extend to our firms. Personal information is any information that identifies an individual or by which your identity could be deduced. In the course of considering whether we can represent you and in representing and providing services to you, we collect some personal information. This policy describes how we collect, use and protect your personal information.

Use Of Your Information

We use your personal information to provide advice and services to you, to administer our client time and billing databases and to include you in our direct marketing activities or legal practice updates. If you tell us that you no longer wish to receive information about our services or about new developments in the law, we will not send any further material. The firms do not disclose your personal information to any third party to enable them to market their products and services. For example, we do not provide our client mailing lists to other law firms.

Consent

We infer that you consent to our collection, use and disclosure of your personal information:

to determine if we can represent you,
to provide professional services to you,
to represent you before the Courts, tribunals, government agencies and with third parties as may be required in carrying out our retainer, and
for legal or practice updates and direct marketing our services to you.

Disclosure Of Personal Information

Under certain circumstances, the firms may also disclose your personal information without further consent:

to any errors and omissions insurers of the firms,
when we are required or authorized by law to do so, for example if a Court issues a subpoena,
where it is necessary to establish or collect fees;
if we engage a third party to provide administrative services to us and that third party is bound by our Privacy Policy,
if we engage expert witnesses or expert assistance on your behalf,
if we retain other law firms or patent and trade-mark agents in other jurisdictions on your behalf,
if the information is already publicly known.

Accuracy

Since we use your personal information to provide services to you, it is important that the information be accurate and up to date. If during the course of the retainer any of your information changes, please inform us so that we can make any necessary changes.

Security

The firms take all reasonable precautions to ensure that your personal information is kept safe from loss, unauthorized access, modification or disclosure. Among the steps taken to protect your information are:

premisese security,
applying technological safeguards like security software and firewalls to prevent hacking and unauthorized computer access,
that third parties who provide administrative services be bound by this policy.

Credit Bureaus

Credit bureaus make credit and acceptance decisions about clients, prevent fraud, check the identity of new clients and prevent money laundering. We may on occasion, request information about you from the files of consumer reporting agencies.

Questions

If you have any questions, or wish to access your personal information, please contact our Privacy Officer at:

Sim & McBurney
Sim, Lowman, Ashton & Mckay LLP
330 University Avenue, 6th Floor
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M5G 1R7