Thank you.
The central theme of our comments this afternoon is our view that PIPEDA's statutory framework is very well suited for innovation.
While there are certain challenges in applying PIPEDA's fair information principles in today's highly dynamic data environment, it is clear that the overall statute has worked and continues to work as an elegant and effective model for organizations to respectfully treat personal information in the course of developing and offering highly innovative and valuable services, products, and features.
The lasting success of PIPEDA in this regard, and the reason PIPEDA can continue to help foster innovation, is largely grounded within the following key features of the statutory framework. PIPEDA is predicated on balancing the interests of individuals and the legitimate need for organizations to process personal information, a balancing that is critical in today's digital economy. PIPEDA's rules are drafted in a principles-based, technologically neutral fashion. Another feature is PIPEDA's accountability model.
PIPEDA remains particularly effective today because it was drafted in a technologically neutral and sectoral-agnostic fashion, and it is well suited to address the seemingly novel privacy considerations that may be raised by new technological developments. As any amendments to the statute are reviewed and considered, it is critically important that PIPEDA remain drafted in a technologically neutral manner, since any statutory requirement that is drafted to focus on a certain data element, process, or ecosystem risks being obsolete and out of date soon after it comes into force.
It is also important to note that while PIPEDA is often referred to as a consent-based statute, in practice, the most powerful feature of PIPEDA is its accountability model, as it provides rules that govern the entire life cycle of an organization's personal information processing. It is important to frame PIPEDA's consent rule as just one part of an organization's broader obligations under the act.
PIPEDA's accountability model is elegant and effective since it holds organizations responsible for their personal information practices and does so in a non-prescriptive manner. The accountability model needs to remain non-prescriptive in nature as this will afford organizations the flexibility to tailor, adapt, and refine their privacy programs in a practical manner that is suitable to the industry sector, size of the organization, nature of a given organization's personal information practices, and evolving commercial needs.
I'm now going to offer a few comments on the continuing viability of PIPEDA's consent requirement, as you've already heard.
As the committee has heard from previous witnesses—