Feds’ data collection ‘blurring’ privacy lines
Watchdog concerned citizens’ protections out of date, Ottawa using unvetted info
OTTAWA— The federal government is “blurring” lines around privacy protections as they look for new ways to collect data on Canadians, documents obtained by the Star suggest.
The documents, prepared for privacy commissioner Daniel Therrien, suggest the 35-year-old Privacy Act may be too “permissive” in how the federal government can collect and use Canadians’ personal information.
The Privacy Act governs how departments and agencies must handle that sensitive data. But while the act was designed to be “tech-neutral,” it was also written in the 1980s — before things such as big-data analytics or ubiquitous social-media platforms were a reality.
“We’ve seen numerous instances where — despite government itself not seeking to identify or track individuals — their program delivery decisions risked doing precisely (that),” read remarks prepared for Therrien, obtained under access to information law.
“It may be our (Privacy Act) is too permissive given the current context of significantly heightened risk.”
Therrien’s warning was aimed at a select group of senior bureaucrats tasked with examining new ways to deliver government services using digital means, while balancing concerns of privacy and transparency.
Canadians expect faster, better and more convenient services, and some departments have turned to tools such as big data analytics or artificial intelligence for answers. But those tools present a risk to not only Canadians’ privacy rights, but also the reliability of the data being collected.
Take, for example, collecting socialmedia posts. The documents show that Employment and Social Devel- opment Canada recently had a pilot project where it collected and analyzed Canadians’ social-media posts. The analysis was meant to replace traditional satisfaction surveys and gauge how satisfied Canadians were with things such as passport services or employment insurance programs.
Therrien’s office raised a number of red flags about using unvetted socialmedia posts to drive government policy.
“In an era of ‘fake news,’ disinformation campaigns and partisan distortion, the dangers in relying on non-vetted social media data for any sensitive decision-making point continue to increase,” the documents read.
“In the past, this was less of a problem for government as the information it collected on citizens en masse was through very structured, calibrated instruments (like the census) or it was taken indirectly from the individual one-to-one (typically, an application form).”
The privacy watchdog also argued that just because a Canadian posts something on such platforms as Twitter or Facebook, it doesn’t mean the information is fair game for government collection and analysis — a point they’ve raised going back to at least 2014.
The Liberal government has committed to overhauling the Privacy Act, but has not yet begun promised public consultations on the issue. The Star requested an interview with the Department of Justice and minister Jody Wilson-Raybould’s office for this article, but had not received a response.
Any Canadian review of privacy laws would take place against the backdrop of sweeping new data protection rules in the European Union, which come into force later this year.
“Commitment to the privacy rights of citizens — as part of their fundamental human rights and newer emerging digital rights — must be part of 21st-century governance,” Therrien’s remarks conclude.