Canadian court finds an emoji is as good as a contract signature

A Canadian court found that a thumbs-up emoji was as legally valid as a contract signature in a dispute between a farmer and a grain buyer in Saskatchewan.

South West Terminal (SWT), a grain and crops input company, sued Achter Land & Cattle for breach of contract after it failed to deliver 87 metric tonnes of flax that SWT claimed it had agreed to with a thumbs-up emoji in a March 2021 text exchange.

Justice T.J. Keene of the Court of King’s Bench for Saskatchewan ruled last month that the two parties had entered into a valid contract with the emoji and that Achter owed SWT more than $82,000 in damages for failing to deliver the flax.

“I agree that this case is novel (at least in Saskatchewan) but nevertheless this Court cannot (nor should it) attempt to stem the tide of technology and common usage,” Keene said in the ruling. 

“This appears to be the new reality in Canadian society and courts will have to be ready to meet the new challenges that may arise from the use of emojis and the like,” he added.

The justice acknowledged that the emoji is a “non-traditional means” of signing a document but still found that it was a “valid way” to both identify the person signing the document and convey their acceptance of the contract.