William
D. Marriott & Associates Ltd. William
D. Marriott & Associates Ltd.
Bill 44: Personal Information Protection Act of Alberta
(PIPA) January 1, 2004
The purpose of this document is to outline the implications of PIPA for the Marriott Surface Land Compensation Database.
Background
PIPA will have far reaching implications in the ways that the Oil and Gas Industry does its business, particularly in its dealings with the agricultural community. An excellent source of background information on PIPA is
Alberta Civil Liberties Research Centre - Privacy Update
Issues
According to the Act, personal information is information about an identifiable individual.
1. Is the information in the Database “personal”? According to the Help Desk “information revealing an individual’s financial circumstances is personal information”. So even though Surface Compensation data is descriptive of a piece of real estate it is personal information because it reveals the financial terms of the lease and thus the lessee’s financial circumstances.
2. Is the information in the Database about an “identifiable” individual? How can it be “identifiable” since the Database does not contain the name of the lessee? According to the Help Desk “If the individual can be identified from the information provided it is considered to be personal information of an identifiable individual, even if a name is not used.” This means that if an individual can be identified indirectly then the information is about an identifiable individual.
3. What about data collected prior to January 1, 2004? The Act deems that consent was provided for all data collected prior to January 1, 2004. This means that none of this data is in violation of the Act.
Changes to the Database
William D. Marriott & Associates Ltd. will ensure that the data reported from the Database is not in violation of the Act. We have no interest in being criminally prosecuted or open to civil litigation. Nor do we wish that any of our data suppliers be subject to criminal prosecution. We believe that the probability of a complaint against the Database is extremely small. We currently have 24,000 records on the Database and in the nine years of its existence we have not had one single complaint from a landowner concerning a violation of confidentiality.
1. Changes to the reports. For data collected prior to January 1, 2004 the reports will be unchanged. However, for data collected after December 31, 2003 the Section will be reported as 0 (zero). This will make it impossible to uniquely identify a landowner from the lease data.
2. Are there any changes to submitting data? No. Continue to provide the Section and LSD information as required on the form. We use this information for quality control purposes and to organize the data in the Database.
Future Developments
1. Industry Developments. The Oil and Gas Industry’s response to PIPA will continue to evolve. One option is a change to the standard lease which would include a consent to collect, use and disclose the lease information. In this case, we would be able to publish the Section once again without out being in violation of the Act. We will continue to monitor Industry developments.
2. In our discussions with the Help Desk they initially indicated that the Database information was not in violation of the Act. However, when I asked them to express this opinion in writing they would not, but rather took the conservative approach and said it was “off side”. They indicated that they do not provide legal advice and that ultimately an order by the Office of Information and Privacy Commissioner would be required to settle whether the data is in violation of the Act or not. We will be pursuing this with them in order to achieve some certainty for ourselves and our clients.
Feedback
Your views on these changes are welcome. Please email me at mailto:bill
Many companies have introduced new procedures to ensure compliance with PIPA, but because the Act has only just come into effect, commonly accepted business practices have yet to be established. It will take time as legal interpretations are provided and the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner issues orders. However, I consulted with the Alberta government’s Privacy Help Desk and will change the Marriott Database based on the written opinions that they provided to me. As more information becomes available there may be further implications for the Database.
In some cases it is possible to indirectly identify the individual using the Section, Township and Range information on the Database (the Database does not reveal the LSD). For example, where a single landowner owns the entire Section then the Database information coupled with a title search would uniquely identify the landowner. Where there are two or more owners in the Section then additional research would be needed to locate the LSD for the facility. This information, like title information, is publicly available from other sources. If the Section contains only one facility then the individual landowner can be uniquely identified.
In cases where there is more than one facility on a Section with more than one owner then it is impossible to uniquely identify the individual with the lease data published on the Database.
In conclusion, even though the Database does not directly identify individuals, the Database information plus some detective work may, in some cases, allow the lease data to be attributed uniquely to a specific individual. This means that in some cases the data in the Database would be in violation of the Act.