FIPA’s submission to Phases 1 and 2 of a consultation by the federal government on the government’s initiatives under the Open Government Partnership. We resubmitted our comments from previous consultations, and emphasized again the need to update the Access to Information Act.
Release June 24, 2011: New website will help public navigate mounting confusion over health privacy rights in BC
Announcement of the launch of FIPA’s new health privacy website, www.healthinfoprivacy.bc.ca
Huge win for privacy in Supreme Court, federal justification for online spying unconstitutional
Provincial private sector privacy laws will also be affected
The government and security services have justified their current and future mass surveillance by misinterpreting the meaning and importance of ‘metadata,’ despite several privacy experts and Commissioners pointing out that this type of data can reveal detailed personal information about Canadians including their medical history, political leanings, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, and financial state. The Supreme Court has now shown the critics were right.
Provincial privacy laws have similar provisions allowing for collection of personal information without consent, and those provisions are now of questionable constitutionality as well.
In a letter sent before the Supreme Court ruling, BC Information and Privacy Commissioner Elizabeth Denham highlighted concerns about the provincial law having similar problems to the federal legislation:
“The proposal in Bill S-4 has been the focus of some concern and sheds light on privacy issues in relation to the analogous provision in PIPA. Given the extent that personal information is available to some organizations in today’s digital world, there may be unintended consequences in providing authorization for personal information-sharing between organizations under such broad conditions.”
BC and Alberta both have their laws under review, and it is now imperative that these powers be scaled back.
FIPA has been active in this fight going back to the original lawful access proposals brought out at the turn of the century. Click on the links below for some of what we have been saying recently about this and other important privacy issues.
Access in the Academy: Bringing FOI and ATI to Academic Research
Access in the Academy, developed by the Freedom of Information and Privacy Association and Mike Larsen of Kwantlen Polytechnic University (Instructor, Dept. of Criminology), and generously funded by the Law Foundation of British Columbia, is a brand new educational resource that provides a unique and practical look at how researchers, students, and others in the higher education can make the most of FOI and ATI practices.
Although they shed valuable light on just how public records are produced, managed, and distributed (or withheld), FOI and ATI remain a rarity in the university classroom. This resource hopes to change that. By outlining the general contours of our federal and provincial access regimes and by providing strategies for how to incorporate both into your research designs, Access in the Academy makes a much-needed and highly accessible contribution to the Canadian legal research landscape.
Written by one of Canada’s leading FOI and ATI researchers, produced by Canada’s only non-profit organization solely dedicated to protecting and advancing the information rights of citizens, and extensively reviewed by a diverse team of information experts, librarians, advocates, educators, and students, Access in the Academy is a valuable addition to any research syllabus.
For more than twenty years, the B.C. Freedom of Information and Privacy Association has relied on the support of our community to provide resources, educational programming, and one-on-one advice. By making a contribution to the Association in exchange for this resource, you’re helping us provide another two decades of service to Canadians and supporting more publications like this in the future. There is no minimum donation amount. Every bit helps.
Click here to make a donation. We hope you consider supporting the Association, but more importantly, we hope you find Access in the Academy a valuable and practical addition to your research activities!
About the Author: Mike Larsen is a Professor of Criminology at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. He is also Co-Managing Editor of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons (jpp.org), a prisoner-authored and peer-reveiwed journal dedicated to experiential narratives and analysis related to spaces and practices of incarceration. His current research draws on a case study analysis of the Canadian security certificate regime to explore issues at the intersection of national security politics and contestations around access to information and secrecy. Mike has recently compiled an edited volume (with Kevil Walby) called Brokering Access: Politics, Power and Freedom of Information in Canada (UBC Press, 2012). Other forthcoming works discuss systemic access to information requests as a research technique for critical social science and questions of accountability and transparency related to collaborative security practices.
Let us know what you think: If you have comments, questions, or concerns about Access in the Academy, please send them to FIPA at fipa@vcn.bc.ca.