TREB v. Mongohouse (2019) — permanent injunction; scraping MLS by circumventing TPMs is unlawful (Copyright Act s.41 + AUA + third-party licence breaches)
Summary
Claim. TREB obtained a permanent injunction against Mongohouse, a site that scraped MLS data by circumventing TPMs. Framed as Copyright Act s.41 (TPM circumvention) + breach of AUA/confidentiality + third-party licence breaches (Teranet, MPAC). The Federal Court "makes clear: website scraping is illegal" in this context.
Quote.
"Makes clear: website scraping is illegal."
Source. torkin.com analysis, accessed 2026-06-21.
Confidence. Verified / industry-consensus.
Caveats. "Illegal in this context" matters — TPM-circumvention scraping was the specific vector. A scraper that did not circumvent TPMs (e.g., respected robots.txt and only collected fully-public content) would face a different analysis.
Implication / use. Anchors Rule: no scraping. TPM circumvention is unlawful (TREB v. Mongohouse permanent injunction). The clearest "do not do this" line for any MLS-data product.
Related entries
Referenced by (3)
- research-notes Research notes (capture-layer): inside the MLS box — what an Ontario member agent's account exposes, what goes unused, and what they're licensed to do with it (June 2026) relates-to
- rule Rule: no scraping. TPM circumvention is unlawful (TREB v. Mongohouse permanent injunction) depends-on
- reference TREB deploys anti-scraping services, firewalls, IDS, and **encrypted token authentication** as Technological Protection Measures (TPMs) relates-to