The Federal Court of Canada has ordered U.S.-based PayPal to hand over details about its business account customers to Canadian tax authorities.
PayPal must hand over the names, dates of birth, contact information and — in some cases — social insurance numbers of any business account holders in Canada.PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American company operating a worldwide online payments system that supports online money transfers and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper methods like checks and money orders
The court order, obtained by the CRA, forces the U.S.-based payment processing firm to release information about Canadians with PayPal business accounts who processed transactions between the start of 2014 and last Friday.
The company has millions of Canadian customers. The majority have personal accounts, which are unaffected by the court order.
PayPal also notes: "This is a one-time disclosure of information to the CRA for Canadian PayPal Business Account holders that sent or received a payment between 2014 and 2017. This is not an ongoing request for information."
PayPal has 45 days from the day of the court order, which was released on Friday, to comply with it. The company says it has already contacted affected customer