Evidence of meeting #94 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was c-27.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Staff Lawyer, Public Interest Advocacy Centre
First, I'd like to touch upon this idea of whether we are balancing business interests with the privacy interests of individuals. I think we have to remember that businesses, especially digital platforms, already exert an incredible amount of power and leverage over individual consumers. Already, there is no equal balancing there.
What we would like to see in this bill is a prioritization of consumer knowledge and consent, rather than a bill that seems to treat consumer consent as an inconvenience for businesses.
On the topic of consent fatigue, that's a concept we take umbrage with because it seems to be used by industry to push for a progressive paring down of consent. The question that seems to be asked right now is what types of business activities no longer need to be consented to because consumers are tired of the lengthy, repetitive consent requests. The question we should be asking is how we overcome consent fatigue by innovating how consumers can manage their preferences in an easy-to-understand and accessible way. Basically, it's retaining the same level of control over consent as before, but in new ways.
This term “consent fatigue” really shouldn't be the basis for getting rid of consent based on ever-changing consumer expectations that are, in truth, being shaped by the industry itself.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Joël Lightbound
Thank you very much.
Go ahead quickly, Mr. Andrey, because I have one last question.
Managing Director, The Dais, Toronto Metropolitan University
Sure. I'll be quick.
In terms of consent fatigue, there are new exceptions and existing exceptions where people don't even need to be provided knowledge of the things that are happening. For workers, say, no knowledge or gathering of consent is required.
A different committee is at the moment studying the risk of TikTok potentially sending our personal information to China. There are no limits in this bill on any Canadian company sending data to China.
Those are the types of protections that the bill could put in place in terms of comparable protection, so that you don't need to read TikTok's long privacy policy to find that it's in there. I think it's not just about consent. It's also about the protections that are there by default.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Joël Lightbound
Thank you very much.
I have one last quick question.
Mr. McSorley, you mentioned proposed sections 47 and 48 concerning national security, and proposed section 47 in particular. Can you repeat how it differs from PIPEDA? In PIPEDA, under paragraph 7(3)(d), an organization that suspects that an activity is a threat to national defence can still disclose that information.
Can you repeat what difference there is?
National Coordinator, International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group
I didn't raise the difference, because in fact it is the same. We simply believe that it shouldn't be continued under this new bill. We raised those concerns in the review, in the consultation around PIPEDA earlier, that this was already a problematic exception. We don't believe.... It's something that this committee could fix in moving forward with Bill C-27.
November 2nd, 2023 / 5:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Joël Lightbound
That's very interesting. Thank you very much.
Thank you, everyone. That concludes today's meeting.
I'd like to thank the witnesses. It was very interesting
I'd also like to thank the interpreters, the support staff and the Committee clerk.
I hope everyone has a good evening. The meeting is adjourned.