NAFTA renegotiation could affect privacy rules on Canadian data: Geist

The upcoming renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) could include pressure to change rules requiring some information to stay in Canada, University of Ottawa law professor Michael Geist told a Parliamentary committee. He said the talks seem “likely to include U.S. demands that Canada refrain from establishing so-called data localization rules that mandate the retention of personal information on computer servers located in Canada,” he said at a Tuesday appearance in front of the House of Commons standing committee on access to information, privacy and ethics, which is reviewing the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Geist said that “data localization has become an increasingly popular policy measure concerns about U.S.-based surveillance and the subordination of privacy protections for non-U.S. citizens and residents” under the administration of president Donald Trump. Earlier this month, the federal privacy commissioner asked the federal government to push for protection of Canadians’ information in the U.S. Geist also noted that as a response to increasing concerns, companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. have opened Canadian data centres that offer data localization. Their entry has pushed some Canadian telecoms to change tack with their data centre business as the industry has been seeing increasing competition in Canada, the Wire Report has reported. “What I think we are likely to see in NAFTA, what we saw in , largely at the behest of the United States — since they represent some of the companies that tend to store large amounts of data and tend to store it in the United States — are attempts to preclude countries from adopting mandates to require that data be stored locally,” he said. Another issue that could come up is “limitations on data transfer restrictions, which mandate the free flow of information on networks across borders.” The United States has focused on stopping such restrictions, which could “restrict the ability to establish privacy safeguards” in Canada, he said. The European Union has taken the opposite view of the United States and has created “restrictions on the ability to transfer across certain borders,” Geist noted. The committee heard in earlier meetings about the need for Canada to keep up with E.U. privacy policies on issues like the right to be forgotten, or be in danger of losing its adequacy status under E.U. rules, which would mean losing a competitive advantage. “In fact, should the European Union mandate data transfer restrictions, as many experts expect, Canada could find itself between the proverbial privacy rock and a hard place, with the European Union requiring restrictions and NAFTA prohibiting them,” Geist warned. — With reporting Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca and editing by Ahmad Hathout at ahathout@thewirereport.ca

NAFTA renegotiation could affect privacy rules on Canadian data: Geist

Broadcast | March 22, 2017

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NAFTA renegotiation could affect privacy rules on Canadian data: Geist

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