Adam Stinson, from the west coast’s PrivacyWorks Consulting group, reached out to me this week to tell me about a few neat things I figured I would pass along.
First, at his firm, they offer IAPP CIPP/C training as an official training partner, and obviously have to come up with a way to keep delivering the course while everyone is locked up at home. They tried doing it through video streaming technology and it worked pretty well — not unlike my experience training the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions last week. So, they are planning other sessions. If you were looking for some professional development challenges, maybe now’s a great time to sign up to get certified. Click here for details.
Adam also highlighted that the British Columbia government moved to lessen the restrictions relating to data residency. Ostensibly, the temporary allowance to let personal information flow out of Canada is so that public health agencies can utilize tools like Zoom. I think it is really bad policy that British Columbia (and Nova Scotia) have these outdated data localization laws in the first place and that it’s taking a global pandemic for them to realize they need to fix this. As Adam said, “I just find it mind-boggling that after a decade-plus of folks out here screaming about how silly and outdated these data residency laws are, they get changed with a snap of the fingers. [It] will be very interesting to see what happens when things get back to semi-normal and they then try to take away these tools that people have been accustomed to.”
Let’s hope a more reasonable solution is achieved — one where we recognize the global relationships everyone has, but, at the same time where we find ways to protect personal information no matter where it ends up.
This all brings me to another news story from this week. One reason the provinces of British Columbia and Nova Scotia passed their data localization laws in the first place was because of fears that U.S. law enforcement would have easy access to our information — perhaps because of the passage of the U.S.A. Patriot Act. Well, in Canada, we have our own sweeping law enforcement laws and we feature an article (below) about what the Canadian Security Intelligence Service is doing with its new law. Did we strike the right balance when it comes to keeping our national security agencies accountable for the data processing they conduct?
I wonder if Americans would now want to pass data localization laws in order to keep their information safer from the prying eyes of the Canadian national security regime?
Despite everything that’s going on in the world right now, there remains no shortage of privacy news.
As a practitioner in a small, virtual firm, I feel lucky to have found much of this transition relatively seamless, but I know it is affecting many of you in myriad ways. And I have to admit, I miss the gym.
Hope all of you are continuing to stay safe and looking for the silver linings, for example, the opportunities to modernize certain practices.