44th Parl. 1st Sess.
March 7, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, when we hear that certain things can be done through regulation, that calls for a bit of a leap of faith. The bill needs to have clear guidelines and provide specific direction so that the regulations can then be coherent and consistent. It is not good enough to say that things will be done correctly later through regulation.
For instance, the current Bill C‑27 contains no guarantee that when someone asks for their data to be destroyed, it will actually be destroyed and stay that way for any length of time. We will have to work on this to ensure that the regulations really do help Canadians.
111 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I think it is ironic that members of the Liberal Party, the government, are claiming some sort of aversion to big corporations. Obviously, they have not read the bill. Subclause 18(3) says:
(3) An organization may collect or use an individual’s personal information without their knowledge or consent if the collection or use is made for the purpose of an activity in which the organization has a legitimate interest that outweighs any potential adverse effect on the individual
The government does not believe in the protection of personal privacy. It believes in the protection of access to data for companies.
106 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I agree with the summary of that. The government is mostly concerned about big business and the ability to use data. The Conservatives are concerned about individual Canadians and their right to privacy protection.
36 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, last week, the federal government banned the use of the TikTok app on government devices because of data privacy concerns, so it is very appropriate for us to be discussing this matter today. Digital data privacy can be seen as a fundamental right, one that urgently requires strengthened legislation, protections and enforcement. Canadians must have the right to access and control the collection, use, monitoring, retention and disclosure of their personal data.
This is a pressing issue. Realizing that, the European Union introduced the GDPR, its General Data Protection Regulation, in 2016. EU countries were given a couple of years to adapt to this new privacy reality, with the regulation coming into effect in 2018. The GDPR has been used by many other countries as a framework for privacy protection.
With the GDPR as an example, and faced with a changing digital data universe, the government basically did nothing to protect data privacy for Canadians. Perhaps that is an unfair statement. After all, digital and online data privacy was addressed in the last Parliament under Bill C-11. The Liberals recognized that Canada needed to bring its privacy laws into the 21st century.
However, that bill was never passed. Apparently, data privacy was not a big enough issue to be made a priority, and the digital charter implementation act was scrapped in favour of an election that Canadians neither wanted nor needed. Now we are asked once again to address this subject. It is indeed better late than never. I would have hoped, though, that with the delay, the government could have improved on what it is proposing.
Perhaps if the government had moved a little faster, Canadians would not have had to question how their data was being used and how their privacy was being invaded by governments and corporations. We are left to wonder how many privacy breaches have gone undetected or unreported. The ones we know of are disturbing enough. Tim Hortons used its app to track customer movements. The RCMP used Clearview AI’s illegally created facial recognition database. Telus gave customer location data to PHAC.
353 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Edmonton Manning for saying something at the start of his speech that we believe is quite important. He said that a lot of our personal data is already compromised. It is already compromised because the government was so lax before introducing legislation. It would not even have gone ahead with Bill C‑27 if it had not felt pressured by the European legislation.
Bill C‑27 does nothing to protect individuals whose data is already compromised, so does my colleague from Edmonton Manning have some ideas for amendments that would address that?
101 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, yes, we absolutely support it being separated out. It is such a big issue to tackle, and we should tackle these things individually. They are huge issues.
As a testament to when we worked in ethics, often, across the aisle, we do not agree on things in this place, but the one thing we agreed on in our ethics committee was that we all cared about our privacy and Canadians' data. Among the Liberals across the way, there were a couple of members who were supportive of where we were going. I think, in the efforts of supporting all Canadians' right to privacy by not having our data sold and farmed out to the highest bidder, it is in our best interest to defend all Canadians' privacy in this place.
132 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, we have talked about legitimate interest being an exception of a business being able to use data without permission. Another provision in the act, subsection 15(5), gives a business the ability to do implied consent, which is really consent without consent.
Can you comment on how the Liberals are in the pockets of big tech on that?
60 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, the evidence that the current government has been in the back pocket of big tech has been there since the member across the way, the member for Vaughan who is not here anymore, was just so obviously supporting Google in all its ambitions.
We all understand that there is interest for data. It is something we need to use, but it needs to be done with proper—
70 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I think anonymizing and aggregating data is extremely important. One example we saw where that was not necessarily taking place was with Tim Hortons. A couple of years ago, if someone had the app and was going to the store to buy a product, or if they just had it on their phone and went through there, Tim Hortons would track where people were going for a period of time after they had been at the store. It was very clear where that data was going and what it was going to be used for, because it was not anonymized or aggregated.
I do think there is something to be said for having a proper regime in place to make anonymization and aggregation take place. It does happen in some cases, but I think it needs to be utilized a lot more in cases where people's data is there. People need to know for sure, have absolute confidence, that it will be done and that the data cannot be unscrambled. We have heard many times in other committees that the unscrambling of data can happen and that it can happen quite quickly too, so we need to make sure people are protected, even if their data is being anonymized and aggregated.
214 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, my colleague is probably hearing from constituents, as I am. The bill seems to be silent on the selling of personal data. It is silent on facial recognition. She mentioned the artificial intelligence part of it. It seems that the new artificial intelligence part of it was just jammed alongside, and there is not a lot of thought in there.
She did not comment on the concept of implied consent. I thank my Liberal colleague for bringing up the protection issues. The bill does mention the term “implied consent”. That would allow businesses to take a user's consent to use their data and information for new purposes without actually obtaining it. I wonder if she could comment on that and why it is so important to get that right.
134 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, while it is true that this bill contains the provision for substantial fines, who is going to be fined? Who would it apply to?
Will the tech giants, with their armies of lobbyists and lawyers, figure out the loopholes within all the ambiguity in this law? For a small business owner, who is not in the business of harvesting data but nevertheless must collect information to complete a transaction, will this just give more red tape and more potential liability while letting off the tech giants?
I do not know the answer to that question, and it should be clearer in this bill.
105 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, I was hoping the hon. member could just elaborate a bit on some of the concerns around the personal information and data protection tribunal. It seems there is no justification for this tribunal. No privacy regime in the world has this tribunal. It introduces unprecedented levels of complexity, potential delays and uncertainty, so I am curious about the member's thoughts on this.
65 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
Madam Speaker, this legislation needs to be flexible. As I mentioned in my speech, it applies not only to big corporations but to smaller companies and companies that use a lot of personal data as well as companies that use very little personal data. It has to be flexible. It has to be able to work in different situations. It has to be able to work in the future because, as we have seen, technology advances very quickly. We need legislation to be able to adapt regardless of the changes in technology that are happening before we can change the laws to accommodate.
103 words
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- menumenu
- notificationsnotifications
- home
- mailmail
- searchsearch
