Evidence of meeting #17 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was data.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
In the case of the API, you are getting consent because you have to download an app from the public health authority in order to enable that functionality.
Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
That's great. Thank you.
That brings me to my other question. As we know, whenever a user installs an application, they are asked to provide their consent. Between you and I, there's no denying that most people don't read the fine print and hastily tick “I agree”. I know that's not your fault, and that it's every person's responsibility. That said, those conditions and requirements that the user has to accept never explain what happens to the data after they tick “I agree”. I'd like you to shed some light on that for us.
What happens to my data after I tick “I agree”?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
In the case of Android, what you can see when you're downloading an app is there are very granular specifications of what data they're looking for. You can click on each type of data to see an explanation of why they are looking for it. Furthermore, you can deny the app access to that data. In some cases that means the app won't work, but in most cases you can be very specific about what data it has access to and when it has access to it.
In relation to your question about privacy policies and terms of service, we've also taken steps to make sure that those are more clear-cut and understandable, especially on mobile devices.
Liberal
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I'll leave this question open to any of the witnesses who want to jump in.
With regard to the methodology of contact tracing and the public resources to gear us towards it, we know that turning on and off the devices will skew results. There is also the reliability of the data itself through the actual processing.
I don't know whether there are strong feelings out there about this, but I've always worried about how much public policy we do through contact tracing in the general sense, because it is anonymous or is supposed to be anonymous. It's also optional, and we don't have the other variables in there.
Are there any thoughts on that? I'll put that out on the floor, if somebody would like to jump in.
Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mimik
If I understood the question correctly, it's about adoption. How do we ensure adoption for the user? I believe it's about ensuring that data remain private.
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
It's also about the quality of the data that influences public policy. If I turn off all of my data tracking, that's not going to provide any balance in terms of.... It's about a participation rate. It's similar to the census. It's skewed. If it's about location definition, we don't know what the skew is at any particular point in time.
Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mimik
I believe that can be addressed by incentivizing users, providing them the right service and giving them options to decide what type of data they want to share with the health authority and with other central authorities. I believe that's the only way. If I have control over....
Again, this is not consent, because consent is quite ambiguous. This is about being able to pick and choose whether you want this data to be accessible by this entity for this period of time so that they have the right to copy it or they don't, or have the right to view it or they don't.
Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mimik
[Inaudible—Editor] and to have usage and to basically achieve the best of both worlds.
NDP
Brian Masse NDP Windsor West, ON
I'm just very skeptical of the statistics and how meaningful they are.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sherry Romanado
Thank you very much.
That completes our third round. We do have a bit of time left, so we can start some slots on the fourth round.
With that, we'll give the first five-minute round to MP Gray.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
My questions are for Mr. McKay again, please.
You have the mobility reports that you've been working on. Would you recommend that governments use these mobility reports for any kind of policy decision?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
What we've seen since the mobility reports have been rolled out is that public health authorities are using them as one data point in assessing whether or not their public health orders around social isolation and broad-based community behaviour are, in fact, working. That was our intent: to provide that trend-based analysis so that they would have an impression of whether or not society is changing as a result of their guidance.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
If the governments are utilizing this information when they're having their discussions and if the public is also seeing this information—because we've seen some of these reports as headlines in the news, where people are moving to.... I just want to draw your attention to the bottom of the mobility report. You do have a disclaimer that states that people have to be opted in as users, that the data represents a sample of users, that this may or may not represent the exact behaviour of a wider population. That's at the bottom of your 10-page report.
With that type of a disclaimer, how much of a representation is it truly? What percentage of the population is it actually representing? Is it 0.01% of the population? Is it 90% of the population? These are headlines. The governments are actually talking about these numbers. What does it actually represent?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
We haven't disclosed the actual representation. You're right. It is a subset—opted-in users—of a subset—Android phone users and Google account users. What is useful from the information is the way that it provides a comparison with a baseline before COVID-19 hit, which is from early January to early February, which is relevant for most of the world. It provides that comparator, which is a data point that's useful as people try to assess whether or not they're seeing behaviour change.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Okay. Has Google Canada been approached by any governments with regard to expanding the scope of the data to include more data being disclosed in these community mobility reports?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
The government and public health authorities are interested, as everyone is, in seeing whether or not trends are changing or are relevant in their own communities. We are rolling that out gradually and globally. In the United States, you can see data down to the county level. That would be the next iteration of the report for Canada if we roll it out.
That isn't specifically a request from the government or public health authorities. Rather, it's the way that we're developing the report and providing the information as we can process it.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
You've gone in to my next question, around breaking it down more closely. Right now when we look at the reports, you have them by province or territory. Do you have plans to break this down further, such as by municipality or region, and to share that data with governments?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
We've already done that in some jurisdictions. The intent is to roll out that next level of data—whether it's at the municipal, county or regional level—and to make that public just as we have the reports themselves right now.
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
When you say that you've already done that for some jurisdictions, does that include within Canada, or—
Conservative
Tracy Gray Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
You've done that in other parts of the world, and now you're going to be considering breaking it down further within jurisdictions and municipalities in Canada. What would be the smallest subset that you're considering? Would it be geographic? Would it be based on town? Would it be based on population? Would it be based on users? How small would you go for that reporting?
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
The variable here is the hierarchy of data that we have available to us in our Google Maps product and how it's classified. It's an interesting conversation because we divide differently those areas that you just described, depending on the province. Some are regional municipalities. Some are united counties. Others are cities. That's part of the process that we're going through right now to identify how we can make that information available.