Alberta has recently introduced Bill 33 – a public sector privacy “modernization” bill. Alberta has put significantly more thought into its modernization bill than Ontario, who introduced modest FIPPA reforms in a more splashy and less substantive reform bill earlier this year. This means Bill 33 is significant because it is leading. Might it set the new public sector norm?

Here are Bill 33’s notable features:

• Bill 33 will require public bodies to give pre-collection notice of an intent to input personal information into an “automated system to generate content or make decisions, recommendations or predications.” Automated system is not defined, and it is unclear if this is meant to foster decision-making transparency or transparency about downstream data use.
• Bill 33 will require breach notification and reporting based on the “real risk of significant harm” standard. Reports to the OIPC and the Minister responsible for the Act will be required. Requiring reports to the regulator and government is novel.
• Bill 33 will prohibit the sale of personal information “in any circumstances or for any purpose.” Sale is not defined.
• Bill 33 has an allowance for disclosing personal information if the disclosure would not constitute an unjustified invasion of personal privacy. This flexible allowance – which contemplates balancing interests – does not typically apply outside of the access request context.
• Bill 33 has a prohibition on data matching to produce derived personal information about an identifiable individual. This matching will only be permitted for “research and analysis” and “planning, administering, delivering, managing, mentoring or evaluating a program or service” unless additional allowances are implemented by regulation. The Alberta OIPC has said that “research and analysis” should be defined, and that that there should be a transparency requirements for data matching.
• Bill 33 will establish rules regarding de-identified or “non-personal data.” The rules will permit disclosure of non-personal data to another public body without restriction, but disclosures of non-personal data to others will be limited to specified purposes and subject to requirements that render downstream users accountable to the disclosing public body. Public bodies will also have a duty to secure non-personal data.
• Bill 33 will require public bodies to establish and implement privacy management programs consisting of documented policies and procedures. It will also mandate privacy impact assessments in circumstances that will be prescribed, with submission to the OIPC also to be prescribed in some circumstances.

There is a long list of exceptions to the indirect collection prohibition in the Bill, but no exceptions that permit the collection of personal information for threat assessment purposes. Violence threat risk assessments have become a standard means by which educational institutions discharge their safety-related duties. “VTRAs” rest on an indirect collection of personal information that should be expressly authorized in any modernized public sector privacy statues.