Ottawa, October 2, 2007 – The federal government’s
plan to amend the Criminal Code to better address identity
theft is a welcome first step towards stopping the explosion of a costly
and emotionally devastating fraud, says Jennifer Stoddart, the Privacy
Commissioner of Canada.
“Canadians have reason to fear being the victim of identity theft,” says
Commissioner Stoddart. “The financial repercussions of losing
their personal information can be crippling, and can affect victims
for years to follow. The
problem of identity theft highlights the value of personal information
and the need to protect it.”
“Today’s announcement
is encouraging. It promises to provide
law enforcement officers with the tools to pursue identity thieves
or fraudsters before Canadians suffer actual financial harm,” says
the Commissioner, who will be closely reviewing details of the government’s
plan in the coming days.
While this is a welcome step, the Commissioner still believes
that the federal government must develop a broad-based strategy
for tackling this type of fraud.
A comprehensive strategy should also include, for example:
Measures to halt the dramatic proliferation of spam, which
ID thieves often use to trick people into revealing personal
information. Canada is the only G-8 country without anti-spam
legislation.
A plan to address “pretexting” – where a
fraudster tries to obtain personal information about an individual,
such as financial or telephone records, by posing as that person
or someone else authorized to have the information.
Reform of the badly out-of-date Privacy Act to ensure
that personal information collected by federal departments and
agencies is adequately protected.
More extensive public education campaigns aimed at helping
Canadians better protect their personal information.
Past efforts to combat identity theft and fraud using personal
information have been hampered by a lack of coordination among
various government departments and agencies, the provinces, law
enforcement agencies and private-sector organizations.
As the Commissioner told the Standing Committee on Access to
Information, Privacy and Ethics in May 2007: “We need better information
about identity theft. One reason for the lack of information is
the lack of a centre of responsibility. Everyone is interested
in preventing identity theft, but no one has overall responsibility
for doing anything about it,” said the Commissioner.
The Privacy Commissioner’s submission to the committee is
available at http://www.privcom.gc.ca/parl/2007/sub_070508_e.asp.
The Privacy Commissioner of Canada is mandated by Parliament to
act as an ombudsman, advocate and guardian of privacy and the protection
of personal information rights of Canadians.
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For more information and/or media interview requests, contact:
Colin McKay
Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Tel: (613) 995-0103
E-mail: cmckay@privcom.gc.ca
