A partial solution

Maple Leaf Politics points out that the Alberta legislature has introduced legislation to limit the distribution of Albertans' personal information. Like MLP, I'll applaud Alberta's efforts, and hope that other provinces follow suit. But unfortunately, the bill won't have quite as strong an effect as MLP appears to think. And the ultimate effect may be just the opposite: the fact that the legislature has spoken up may merely force all the more requests into the most secretive forum possible.

On its face, the bill should "effectively halt any requests made under the US Patriot Act for personal information". Other means aside from the Patriot Act provisions exist to allow the U.S. to seek personal information, and part of the test in those cases is the degree to which the information is protected - both through contracts and through statutes such as the Alberta legislation. So to the extent that it's possible to challenge disclosure through these means, the legislation will indeed help matters.

But as I've pointed out before, one of the more scary aspects of the Patriot Act is that the disclosure of the information simply isn't open to challenge, and in fact it's an offence to so much as disclose that the request has been made. Which means that if U.S. authorities want to avoid having to justify their request over the admonition contained in Alberta's legislation, the Patriot Act provides the ideal means for them to do so...regardless of what any provincial legislature has to say about the issue.

It's well and good for Canada to send a message, both on a provincial and a federal level, to say that we won't stand to have our information available upon the whims of U.S. authorities. But absent a change in U.S. policy to eliminate the secrecy of the Patriot Act, there will always be a way around that declaration as long as information about Canadians finds its way into the hands of U.S.-controlled companies. And a loss of business resulting from privacy fears may well be the only factor which could force the U.S. to make that change.