Now that was a conference!
Before diving into all that was the IAPP Canada Privacy Forum 2024, let me gush for a moment over the IAPP staff who worked tirelessly to put it all together.
It's not always evident how much work and planning goes into an event like CPS. I'm lucky enough to work with them as they get it all done and I’m always so impressed, and fairly exhausted for them. I don’t know how they do it.
There were over 1,000 people at our event in Toronto. We had nearly 100% of the registrants show up. Most of us there were Canadian but there were also several hundred Americans, including a good number from Montana — does anyone know why? Other attendees came from Argentina, Australia, Belgium, China, Finland, India, Italy, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and the U.K.
The rest of the world appears to be keenly interested in learning about what's going on in Canada's privacy industry.
We also attracted a terrific number of first-time attendees. For 44% of the people in attendance, it was their first opportunity to witness the energy, networking and learning that we manage to pull off each year.
There were lots of breakout sessions that covered a myriad of topics, including artificial intelligence governance, privacy impact assessments, privacy program maturity assessments, Indigenous privacy issues, health care privacy, advertising technology and more. Safe to say, there was something for everyone.
Throughout the years, I’ve been teaching law students at the University of Ottawa, and, year after year, I get to see so many of them gather at the Symposium and come say hi to me. It’s nice to see the next generation of privacy pros picking up the mantle.
The keynote remarks were all informative. Privacy Commissioner of Canada Philippe Dufresne took the occasion to announce his joint investigation with the U.K. Information Commissioner's Office into the 23andme data breach and announced a consultation into age-appropriate design. Apart from those big announcements, there were tons of other nuggets in the OPC's annual address to the profession.
The other keynote sessions were great as well, but I’ll just quickly call out one that was particular inspiring and impactful: the Ian Kerr Memorial Lecture, delivered by Ian's friend and collaborator Woodrow Hartzog. It not only was informative and provocative, but it was a very candid and emotional tribute to Ian’s legacy and a good reminder of Ian's approach to grounding technological innovations to humanity and his appreciation of ketchup chips.
Of course, I can't let you go without mentioning the Commissioner's Game Show. This year, we played Never Have I Ever. As usual the session was informative as well as humorous, with one commissioner sharing how she may have circumvented a procedure regarding age verification and parental consent to get a tattoo when she was a teenager. Yes, we cover a lot of ground with the Game Show.
My special thanks to Patricia Kosseim, Michael Harvey, Tricia Walsh and Phillipe Dufresne for being such good sports.
We are already planning next year's event. I hope to see you back in Toronto next spring.
Kris Klein, CIPP/C, CIPM, FIP, is the managing director for Canada at the IAPP.