from: http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSTopNews/government_may16.html Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSTopNews/government_may16.html">G overnment database tantamount to a citizen pro…</A> ----- Privacy commissioner reveals government database By NAHLAH AYED-- The Canadian Press OTTAWA (CP) -- There's a massive government database that tracks the lives of ordinary Canadians -- a Big Brother that wasn't supposed to exist, the federal privacy commissioner revealed Tuesday. Bruce Phillips sounded an alarm bell in his annual report to Parliament, warning Canadians that the Human Resources Department database is "tantamount to a citizen profile" and vulnerable to misuse. The "extraordinarily detailed database" holds a dossier on almost every person in Canada with as many as 2,000 pieces of information about each person's education, marital status, ethnic origin, mobility, disabilities, income tax, employment and social assistance history. Concerns raised by privacy commissioner -- Existence of federal government computer database with as many as 2,000 pieces of information about each Canadian. -- Government should be cautious about releasing confidential data from 1906 and 1911 census records because it could diminish confidence in government promises. -- An updated Privacy Act, which applies to the federal public sector, is needed. The act hasn't been revised for 20 years and is not as rigorous as the new bill that applies to the private sector. -- Commissioner disappointed the government rejected a recommendation from a Commons committee to put in law who may use information from a person's Social Insurance Number and for what purposes. -- Commissioner expressed concern numerous projects to collect, share and use personal health information are proceeding without action on promises to protect the privacy of patients. It's all in a single, permanent database that tracks Canadians from cradle to grave. "Successive privacy commissioners have assured Canadians that there was no single federal government file or profile about them," Phillips said in his report. "We were wrong -- or not right enough for comfort." The information on 33.7 million people, dead and alive, is taken from income tax returns, child tax benefits, immigration and welfare files, the National Training Program, Canadian Job Strategy, employment services, employment insurance, job records and the social insurance master file. The only government department which regularly gathers such comprehensive information -- Statistics Canada -- operates under strict laws with penalties for those who misuse information. There are no similar laws regulating the use of the Human Resources database and that "poses significant risks to our privacy," said Phillips. The database is "always open to misuse or abuse unless there are legislated, legal restraints on its use," he said in an interview. While the Privacy Act allows collecting personal information for research, this database raises concerns because it's so comprehensive. If the information was divided up, there would be "lower risk of indiscriminate collection, unrelated uses and improper disclosures," Phillips said in the report. The department, which has been attacked for months in the Commons for mismanaging grants, says it's not breaking the law and it relies on staff professionalism to prevent misuse of the database, created in 1985 and continually updated. "All the information is secure, it's encrypted," said Human Resources Minister Jane Stewart. The data is used to ensure government programs are working, she said. Phillips is recommending a fixed shelf-life for data, penalties for misuse, strict control on collection and legislative changes to set out the research mandate of the database. Pippa Lawson of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre is worried that personal information could be sold. "History has shown governments can go off the rails," she said in an interview. "There's a huge market out there for personal information, for marketing purposes in particular. We've already seen municipal and provincial governments selling databases." Earlier this year, reports indicated Ontario's Transportation Ministry sold personal information to private companies. A research database could also "be retrieved in unforeseen ways -- by disabilities or ethnic origin, for example -- to the detriment of individual rights," said Phillips, who noted the information is never purged. "Without an end, the temptation is to subject everyone to unrelenting information surveillance. This database needs limits." The database is virtually invisible, although it's on a government database list and the Human Resources Web site. Copyright © 2000, Canoe Limited Partnership. 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