Quebec’s minister of justice announced her intention to introduce a bill aimed at modernizing the privacy regime provided by the Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector.
Although few details have yet to be publicly disclosed, the changes proposed by the new legislation seem to focus on the following five themes: (i) tighter rules governing the consent of persons concerned, (ii) the possibility for these individuals to withdraw their consent and the company’s obligation to destroy their personal information it holds, (iii) the obligation for the company to report any security incident, including loss of data, (iv) increased powers granted to Quebec’s access to information commission and higher applicable penalties, and (v) the Act’s expanded scope of application to public bodies. Should this bill pass, the Quebec regime could become the most onerous in Canada in this area.
For more information, see our legal update discussing the proposed legislation.
