Both the Ontario Provincial Conservatives and the Ontario NDP are objecting to the contract signed by the governing Liberals.
Both the Ontario Provincial Conservatives and the Ontario NDP are objecting to the contract signed by the governing Liberals.
Good thing I don’t hunt or fish. I definitely would not be pleased.
There was quite a bit of contraversy last year when employees of some Swiss companies heard that their salary calculation and payments would be processed by offshore companies in Hong Kong or Singapore, hence potentially subjecting their private information to the scrutiny of a foreign jurisdiction. This is much the same thing. The data about Canadian’s rifles should be stored in Canada.
This reminds me of Lockheed Martin’s involvement in our Canadian census. I continue to be counted among the “count me out” and “no Lockheed Martin” and “opt out” Canadians who object to a US weapons manufacturer and Patriot Act bound corporation playing any role at all in what should be an all Canadian process. Any long form census which finds its way to our door is immediately trashed. Having Lockheed Martin involved in our census is as wrong as it would be for Diebold to be involved in our elections should that ever happen.
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=2242
http://forum.actionparty.ca/forum/General-Discussion/2902-Opt-Out-of-CANADAS-2011-CENSUS.html
http://www.countmeout.ca/
With the proliferation of cloud computing, there is going to be much, much more of this. It’s a challenge to use data storage, email, really, all of the cloud services provided, but which actually keep the data in Canada. Sometimes you have to dig deep to even find where the data will be stored. And sometimes they go to great lengths to avoid telling you. Google has no servers in Canada. University of Alberta and City of Edmonton both moved their email to Google. U of A worked out an agreement with them that Google had to abide by our laws. Not sure what City of Edm did. However, note that “The University has agreed to inform the student body and employees that it won’t be able to guarantee protection against possible disclosure of emails residing in the United States.”
It’s becoming a scary world out there…. between emails and data residing in the US, financial data reporting to the US….I’m not liking it, personally, but I feel pretty alone on this, so many people just don’t see the same problems that I do.
@ outragedcanadian
You are not alone. Personally I don’t use Google — switched to StartPage ages ago. Its privacy policy is even endorsed by Dr. Katherine Albrecht, founder of CASPIAN. The only disadvantage of StartPage is that it doesn’t work as well as a verb as google does. Bit awkward to say I startpaged that topic.
@Em, thank you, I’d never heard of them. I’m going to go check them out thoroughly. Doesn’t resolve the email issue, but, for searching, it’s nice to see that they say they don’t track your IP address!
Re; Canadian information and the Patriot Act.
Here is a Privacy Commissioner case in which Canadian credit card account information was shipped out of Canada – to be processed by a third party provider in the US – when it crossed the border into the US – it was then subject to the Patriot Act.
http://www.priv.gc.ca/cf-dc/2005/313_20051019_e.asp
The issue as described in this case is very nuanced, so it is difficult to grasp only from an extract like that below – the whole case should be read in it’s entirety.
………………..
“In the Assistant Commissioner’s view, the real concern underlying these complaints is the prospect of a foreign government accessing Canadians’ personal information.
She concluded, however, that the Act cannot prevent U.S. authorities from lawfully accessing the personal information of Canadians held by organizations in Canada or in the United States, nor can it force Canadian companies to stop outsourcing to foreign-based service providers. What the Act does demand is that organizations be transparent about their personal information handling practices and protect customer personal information in the hands of foreign-based third-party service providers to the extent possible by contractual means. This Office’s role is to ensure that organizations meet these requirements. In the case of these complaints, these requirements have been met.”………..