Law360 Canada (November 3, 2026, 4:59 PM EST) -- The B.C. Civil Resolution Tribunal (CRT) has rejected social media platform X’s bid to recover about $119,000 in costs from a woman whose intimate image remains accessible to X users outside Canada after X chose to geofence it rather than delete it as ordered.
In
Re X Corp., 2026 BCCRT 1563, vice-chair Eric Regehr held that it would be contrary to the CRT’s mandate and unfair to the applicant to order her to pay any of X’s legal fees.
However, the tribunal also dismissed the woman’s application for a further $100,000 administrative penalty, finding that X’s geoblocking constituted reasonable steps under a statutory defence despite not satisfying the deletion order.
“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. This would undermine the purpose of the administrative penalty scheme,” Regehr wrote.
X did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The tribunal ordinarily does not publish its decisions, however the vice-chair chose to do so as the tribunal had published the previous decision in this case, which was the first instance in which the tribunal had ordered an internet intermediary to pay an administrative penalty.
In March 2025, the applicant, whom the vice-chair referred to as TR, obtained a protection order under the
Intimate Images Protection Act (IIPA). TR provided the protection order to X, which responded by geoblocking the image to prevent it from being viewed in Canada.
In
Re X Corp., 2025 BCCRT 1228, the tribunal concluded that X had failed to fully comply with the protection order because it did not delete the image and remove it from the platform. It ordered X to pay a $100,000 administrative penalty under s. 13 of the IIPA.
Even after the tribunal imposed the penalty, X did not delete the image. TR brought an application for a further $100,000 penalty against X.
X argued that it had taken reasonable steps to address the unlawful distribution of the intimate image through geofencing and was therefore not liable to pay a further penalty.
The tribunal noted that X had provided more detailed evidence and submissions and raised new issues in response to the application for a further penalty than it had in the previous proceeding.
Although the tribunal again found that X had not complied with the deletion order, it interpreted s. 12 of the IIPA as providing a defence to administrative penalties where an internet intermediary proves it took reasonable steps to address the unlawful distribution of intimate images through its services.
X argued that geoblocking images that contravene the IIPA reasonably addresses their distribution because it is a global platform subject to many different legal regimes governing what people are allowed to post.
It submitted that it would be unreasonable to expect it to strictly comply with B.C. law by deleting the image, with global effect, when United States law would not require its removal.
The tribunal accepted this argument and found that requiring a United States corporation to delete content that is lawful there from its United States servers would violate the comity of nations.
Regehr concluded that X’s practice of geoblocking content within Canada in response to orders under s. 5 of the IIPA reasonably addresses the unlawful distribution of intimate images through X’s services.
X sought reimbursement of about $107,000 in legal fees and about $12,000 for an expert report.
The tribunal noted that awarding legal fees and dispute-related expenses is discretionary and that the CRT’s mandate to be accessible and economical must be borne in mind when considering such claims.
Regehr noted that the administrative penalty scheme under the IIPA provides an accessible alternative to contempt proceedings in the B.C. Supreme Court.
“The existence of an accessible enforcement process is especially important when applicants are seeking to enforce a protection order against large internet intermediaries with vast resources, like X,” Regehr wrote.
He further observed that applicants have no financial upside from a successful penalty application, noting that their only motivation is that a penalty, or the risk of one, will coerce reluctant respondents to comply with the protection order.
He held that the CRT should therefore be cautious about imposing financial consequences on applicants pursuing enforcement against internet intermediaries.
In this case, Regehr noted that TR had already succeeded in having the CRT order X to pay an administrative penalty and that she had been unsuccessful on the second application because of complex international legal principles.
“Overall, I find that TR had a reasonable belief, backed by evidence, that the protection order required X to delete her intimate image. She therefore had a rational and good faith basis for prosecuting this application,” the vice-chair wrote.
The tribunal dismissed the application for a further administrative penalty and X’s claim for dispute-related expenses.
Counsel for X were Andrew Bernstein and Martha C. Côté of Torys LLP. They were not immediately available for comment.
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