Limits Must Be Respected in Canada

There is a piece of legislation in Canada of which you may be unaware. It's called the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act. The Act, better known as the PIPEDA, is designed to protect how personal information is used, collected and disclosed by business. In effect, it protects us from having security agencies going romping through our personal information, stored within whatever databases they decide to target.

The problem is that the RCMP wants to change that. They are proposing that there should be changes that would legally compel companies to give police personal information of employees or customers without their knowledge OR consent. The Mounted Police are also looking for changes to PIPEDA that would prohibit banks, employers and other institutions from informing Canadians the police are looking at their personal information, without first getting the RCMP's permission.

Quite honestly, for anyone who has a firm belief in civil liberties, this is of concern. If you're not concerned about it, you should be.

Canada's Privacy Commissioner is raising some red flags about the RCMP's request. Jennifer Stoddart says the changes would be a critical invasion of privacy and create massive potential for abuse in terms of how personal information is collected by and given to the police. Stoddart said, "It's a basic tenet of our democracy that the citizen cannot be constrained by the state except in certain circumstances. That's why we have judges, that's why we have search warrants. We cannot disrupt someone's private life unless it's for serious, real cause."

You might want to read this copy of a speech given by the Commissioner.

The parliamentary Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics is currently undertaking a mandatory five-year review of the PIPEDA and this issue has arisen in that context.