How does the Privacy Commissioner of Canada see the area of drones - and other related high-tech issues? The Commissioner’s role is to act as an advocate of privacy rights and its scope does not include the making of regulation.
RLJ: Are you starting to receive enquiries about drones and privacy?
We do receive questions from time to time about drones.Our Information Centre, which responds to requests for information from the public and organizations regarding privacy issues, has received 22 enquiries from the public about drones over the last couple of years. Some use drones and were seeking privacy advice on best practices, while others had questions about privacy and the commercial use of drones. Some wanted general information for research purposes, whereas others were concerned about drones flying near their properties.
We have also seen a growing media interest in privacy issues and drones. The nature of the enquiries we receive from reporters varies. Sometimes the questions are in relation to a particular incident or whether we’ve ever investigated any complaints about drones. We also receive more general questions about privacy and the use of drones.
How is the issue of special rules for drones being developed?
In terms of the regulation of UAVs, there are two different licensing streams in Canada: Transport Canada is the civil regulatory authority and the Department of National Defence is the military authority.
Transport Canada launched consultations in May on proposed amendments to the regulations governing the safe use of unmanned air vehicles. Our Office has provided comments to Transport Canada as part of this consultation process.
With respect to drones and privacy, we published a research paper in 2013 called Drones in Canada: Will the proliferation of domestic drone use in Canada raise new concerns for privacy?
We continue to keep an active watch on this issue. In June of 2014, we released our privacy priorities for the next five years and surveillance is one of them. Drones will certainly continue to be of interest to our Office.
Are you researching the area still?
Under our Contributions Program, we recently funded a study on the privacy implications of UAVs in Canada. The study by the Queen’s University, Surveillance Studies Centre was published in 2014. The project set out to understand where drones came from, what they are used for and, in particular, what new challenges they raise for privacy, civil liberties and human rights.
We have allocated more than $4 million to some 100 independent privacy research initiatives through our Contribution Program since it was created in 2004 to support independent, non-profit research on privacy, to further privacy policy development and to promote the protection of personal information in Canada. Any opinions expressed in the project summaries and reports are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the OPC.
What is happening on the development of rules on an international basis?
Our Office is not a regulation making body. However, given your interest in the cross-border use of drones, you may be interested in a Resolution of Canada’s Privacy Commissioners and Privacy Enforcement Officials on the Canada-US Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness Action Plan released in 2012. One of the issues that we and our provincial and territorial counterparts raised related to privacy issues related to drones. As new security programs are planned and systems initiated, we called on the Government of Canada to “restrict the use of satellites, unmanned aerial or other vehicles, remote sensors and associated surveillance technologies within Canadian borders and airspace under a proper regulatory framework.”
To what extent are you liaising with other privacy bodies, abroad and at home?
Data knows no borders, and our Office recognizes that we, too, must reach out beyond ours to work with global partners and organizations to develop a global privacy framework. This is an established priority for our Office, and, as such, our Office participates in a number of key international privacy protection initiatives.
Our Office contributed to a Berlin Group’s Working Paper on Privacy and Aerial Surveillance, which draws from our own 2013 research paper.
As a result of amendments to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), Canada’s federal private sector privacy law, which came into force in 2011, our Office has the clear authority to cooperate with our foreign counterparts on issues that affect individuals in other jurisdictions. In fact, we have signed written arrangements with the Dutch, Irish, British, Romanian, Uruguayan and German (federal) data protection authorities.
We are also part of the Global Privacy Enforcement Network, an informal network of privacy enforcement authorities that is intended to promote enforcement cooperation by sharing information about privacy enforcement issues and facilitating effective cross-border privacy enforcement in specific matters.
Furthermore, we are part of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Cross-border Privacy Enforcement Arrangement (CPEA), the Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities (APPA) and others.
The subject of drones is sometimes discussed at these forums and our Office certainly takes part in those discussions.
We have also met with other federal government departments, such as Transport Canada, to discuss the privacy implications of drones. Furthermore, we have been briefed by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and canvassed other security agencies about UAV use and the obligations of departments and agencies to produce Privacy Impact Assessments to identify the potential privacy risks of any new or redesigned federal government program or service.
Are you liaising with manufacturers?
We spoke at the Unmanned Systems Canada 2015 annual industry conference in Halifax in November. We spoke at a similar conference attended by manufacturers in Ottawa in 2011.
Is there anything you would like to say about driverless cars (which will record a lot of information)?
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada is not currently engaged in any work directly related to driverless cars.
We are, however, actively following the issue of vehicular telematics, specifically the data collection made possible by the growing deployment of automotive sensors designed to gather data about driving habits, location, speed and other elements. Potential privacy concerns include the transparency of this collection and the use of telematics data to establish insurance premiums and/or profiling activities.
We have engaged in some discussions with industry stakeholders, insurance providers and many of our provincial counterparts. Our Office is currently looking at the privacy issues that can arise from increasingly smart devices, or the Internet of Things, and we expect to start publishing a series of research papers soon.
The research papers will look at the privacy implications of the Internet of Things and Canada’s regulatory environment, among other things.
Returning for a moment to the subject of automobiles, you may also be interested in a project funded by our Office called "The Connected Car: Who's in the Driver's Seat”. This research project was conducted by the British Columbia Freedom of Information and Privacy Association.
(For more information, visit: https://www.priv.gc.ca/resource/cp/2014-2015/p_201415_06_e.asp.)
Under the same program, we are also funding another project on vehicular infotainment platforms. (See the third project from the top at this link, for a description: https://www.priv.gc.ca/resource/cp/2015-2016/cp_bg_e.asp.)
Is there anything else you would like to add?
You might be interested in the results of a survey question regarding drones in a 2013 poll we commissioned. The survey results suggest that most Canadians are very comfortable with the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to help with search and rescue missions (81%), to patrol the border (66%), and for law enforcement investigations (54%). However, they appear to be less comfortable with the use of UAVs for more general monitoring of the public, such as at events or protests (42%), or for general surveillance of public spaces (35%). For uses related to public monitoring, one in five or more (19-24%) said they were not really comfortable with this at all.
The poll can be found here: http://www.priv.gc.ca/information/por-rop/2013/por_2013_01_e.asp.
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
