Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2022

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Yes. You're good now.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I am putting a question to the minister that directly relates to his area of expertise.

Minister, even though the letter of the Privacy Act was not violated, don't you think the spirit of the act was still trifled with a bit?

Making an announcement does not necessarily mean that information is made public. I want to ensure that such data collection is in keeping with the spirit of the Privacy Act.

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

You said it: the act was not violated. I am glad to hear you say that, because it may help other members of the committee to understand that. As an expert, you could also see that, given the way the data was transmitted to the Canadian government, it was impossible to identify people. The data cannot be "re-personalized". It is simply impossible. You have two important findings. I think the people who are lucky enough to sit on the committee heard you loud and clear.

With regard to other perspectives beyond this debate, I invite you to work with the committee to see if other experts could look at other aspects of this broader issue. These privacy aspects could be addressed by the committee.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

We will certainly do that, thank you.

That said, you still initiated the request, so you can't wash your hands of it. The data may have been clean when returned to you, but you can't wash your hands of the process for obtaining it.

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

You said it very well. The government absolutely must protect privacy. There are two conditions for doing so. The first is to ensure that we comply with the laws—we understand that the act has been respected. The second condition is to ensure that the data collected cannot create any issue or risk in relation to the protection of privacy—we also did that.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Do you think the people whose data was collected understood what was going on?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

Over the past few months, 1.7 million people were able to view the data on the Canadian Weather and COVIDTrends sites. If you type the words “COVIDTrends” into Google, you will immediately see the web page. You'll be able to search by different regions across the country and you'll see what the data looks like.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

They may have, but I wonder if they understood the scope of the data collection.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

This is the last question.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I am not convinced that there was valid user consent. I am not making any judgment or accusation at this point. I'm not. That is not my role, in any case. I am questioning the validity of the consent.

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec, QC]

I am sure the committee must continue to do its work on ethics and privacy. Your role, as members of the committee, is to continue to look at these issues, including the narrower ones like today's and the broader ones, for example, such as the well-known link between collecting information and the use of it—the increasingly easy dissemination and use of information that is collected and shared.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Thank you, Minister.

Mr. Green, you have six minutes.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

It's certainly an important discussion.

I want to take a moment to thank all the witnesses for finding time in their busy schedules to be here, in particular Dr. Tam, who I understand originally was unable to find the time but has made the time to be here today.

My first question is for Mr. Allison.

Mr. Allison, for the purpose of this committee, could you briefly describe your role?

[Christopher Allison, Acting Vice-President, Public Health Agency of Canada]

Thank you. I am very pleased to be here.

Mr. Chair, my role right now is the acting vice-president of the corporate data and security branch in the Public Health Agency. My normal position is the chief data officer for the Public Health Agency of Canada.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Allison, are there any other scenarios in which the government has engaged in these types of contracts for the purpose of other evidence-based decision-making, or is this the first time it has done that?

[Christopher Allison]

I've been in the agency for approximately six months. In this time this is the first contract you're going forward with. The agency broadly does have data-sharing agreements with provinces, territories and research institutions, but I'm not privy to the details of all those agreements, Mr. Chair.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Through you, Mr. Chair, to Mr. Allison, would you be privy to any pre-existing contracts with third-party private corporations that would be a like-to-like comparison today?

[Christopher Allison]

Mr. Chair, regarding the mobility data and the question of Mr. Green, there was interest across government and in some of my previous organizations in making use of large-scale mobility data to better understand the population and to better generate policy. The ability to actually do it, though, has come about relatively recently. In terms of mobility data, the first steps that I've seen come with the COVID pandemic and the desire to actually inform an effective pandemic response.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Through you, Mr. Chair, to Mr. Allison, do you know if the Public Health Agency of Canada as a department is sharing this information with other departments for their decision-making and policy?

[Christopher Allison]

Mr. Chair, the information is raw data. The data received from vendors is not shared, but reports and summaries of those reports are shared with provinces and territories and other organizations for the purposes through which the information was gathered, which is COVID and pandemic response.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Can you anticipate, through you, Mr. Chair, to Mr. Allison, other instances beyond COVID-19 where this data might be used, or is it your intention, or do you have a policy, to destroy the data after it's done?

[Christopher Allison]

I'm not certain of a policy. Right now the contract you're looking at is for a specific period of time, and the intent would be to use the information for the purposes for which it's collected, for that period of time. I believe there are options for several additional years, and there is research internationally about the use of mobility data to support public health.

I believe there are uses beyond COVID, but the agency has not taken any decision to use it beyond the COVID pandemic at this time.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Beyond the intended use.... I can appreciate that.

I will go to Dr. Tam. Again, Dr. Tam, thank you for being here before us. It has been noted by many experts, and in particular Mr. Christopher Parsons, who's the postdoctoral fellow and managing director of the Telecom Transparency Project at the Citizen Lab in the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. He has stated that this is an important opportunity for us to look at the use of data from third parties. On the idea of informed consent—and Mr. Villemure talked about consent—I personally don't believe at face value that consumers, third party, would have known or had informed consent for this particular use of their data.

Through you, Mr. Chair, to Dr. Tam, the repurposing of Canadian cellular networks for things like pandemic mobility travel has provided you with information, yet we're hearing from the minister and others that it wasn't disaggregated, that it didn't have demographic information. It was able to provide only crude assessments of population mobility

I guess my question is, what is the efficacy of this information in assisting PHAC's public health mandate?

[Dr. Theresa Tam, Chief Public Health Officer, Public Health Agency of Canada]

Mr. Chair, this is a novel data source, of course, but one feed, in particular, into data for looking at the response to the pandemic.

Mobility data at this kind of aggregated level can be used when provinces and territories or local jurisdictions enact public health measures to reduce contact rates or to ask people to stay at home, for example, to see whether those measures are actually working. You can see it at an aggregated health unit level.

For example, using Ottawa as a city, the data will show how much percentage increase in mobility there has been in the last period of observation. That helps the local public health departments to figure out if their instructions—