I finally got around to reading the @PrivacyPrivee report of findings on Loblaw’s manner of authenticating those eligible for a gift card. The most significant (or at least enlightening) thing about the report is that the OPC held that residential address, date of birth, telephone number and e-mail address were, together, “sensitive.” It did so in assessing the adequacy of the contractual measures Loblaw used in retaining a service provider for processing purposes. It said:
- The contract also provided guarantees of confidentiality and security of personal information, and included a list of specific safeguard requirements, such as: (i) implementing measures to protect against compromise of its systems, networks and data files; (ii) encryption of personal information in transit and at rest; (iii) maintaining technical safeguards through patches, etc.; (iv) logging and alerts to monitor systems access; (v) limiting access to those who need it; (vi) training and supervision of employees to ensure compliance with security requirements; (vii) detailed incident response and notification requirements; (viii) Loblaw’s pre-approval of any third parties to whom JND wishes to share personal information, as well as a requirement for JND to ensure contractual protections that are at a minimum equivalent to those provided for by its contract with Loblaw; and (ix) to submit to oversight, monitoring, and audit by Loblaw of the security measures in place.
- As outlined above, the additional ID’s requested by the Program Administrator were collected through a secure channel (if online) or by mail, verified and then destroyed.
- In our view, given the limited, albeit sensitive, information that was shared with the Program Administrator, as well as the limited purposes and duration for which that information would be used, Loblaw’s detailed contractual requirements were sufficient to ensure a level of protection that was comparable to that which would be required under the Act. Therefore, in our view, Loblaw did not contravene Principle 4.1.3 of Schedule 1 of the Act.
Residential address, date of birth, telephone number and e-mail address is a set of basic personal information. In analyzing it, one must recall the “contact information” that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice said was not “private” enough to found a class action claim in Broutzas.
Don’t be misled, though. The OPC made its finding because Loblaw was engaged in authentication, and collected a data set precisely geared to that purpose. The potential harm – identity theft – was therefore real, supporting finding that the data set as a whole was sensitive. Context matters in privacy and data security. And organizations, guard carefully the data you use to identify your customers.
All About Information 