2013-14 Annual Report on Federal Privacy Act

Federal Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien tabled his annual report on the Privacy Act in Parliament this week.

The Privacy Act sets out the rules for privacy protection in the federal public sector.

Among the highlights of the report:

• there are many shortcomings in how the Royal Canadian Mounted Police monitors and reports on its collection of subscriber data from telecommunications companies without a warrant
• it includes a technical and legal primer on metadata – the data trail generated each time someone uses a mobile device, computer, telephone or other technologies.
• it offers details on privacy aspects of U.S.-Canada border security initiatives
• the number of data breaches voluntarily reported by federal institutions reached a record high.  It is unclear whether there were actually more breaches or whether more departments and agencies chose to report them
• the document also summarizes the complaints under the Privacy Act handled by the Office