When I sit down to write the introduction to the digest, the kind folks who work on the publication always send me an email or two with news stories they're tracking. But, since the end of winter, a strange thing has been happening in Canada. Unlike the rest of the world, in Canada, it appears there are fewer privacy issues being reported in the news.
We know, from poll after poll, that the Canadian population is almost unanimous about privacy being a concern for them. We all care about it and want our privacy rights to be respected. But this collective concern has not led to any significant changes to our privacy landscape since before the internet became a real thing.
At one point, Canada was ahead of many other parts of the world on this issue. But now we've fallen way behind in trying to address the various threats to our privacy rights. Our politicians don't take it seriously and even our news outlets have reduced the number of privacy-related stories they cover.
I think it's indicative of something we should be alarmed about. If almost everyone in Canada thinks it's important, why aren't we seeing an abundance of it reflected in the news and on Parliament Hill?
The recent news about neural artificial intelligence and its implications on privacy has me thinking about where things are headed. Many jurisdictions are dealing with these issues proactively and in a way that should not inhibit innovation. Meanwhile, we aren't modernizing our almost 25-year-old private sector law or our 41-year-old public sector law, let alone grappling with the changes to society that today's newest technologies are going to bring.
I read a post on LinkedIn that the IAPP now hosts over 1,000 different types of events per year. In Canada, we still account for a good number of those thanks to our volunteers and, in particular, to the people who work at putting our great conference together. Not too many countries in the world have their own IAPP conference, so we are lucky. There's a lot going on in this area in Canada, despite the lack of news coverage or legislative progress.
So, on the flipside of the coin, we just closed the call for proposals to speak at next spring's IAPP Canada Privacy Symposium 2025 and there were over 140 fantastic submissions. Considering we can only program about 40 to 45 sessions, this means there are going to be around 100 submissions left on the cutting room floor.
While that part is unfortunate, it's also very encouraging that our privacy, AI and cybersecurity community is keeping the dialogue going up here. For the sessions that don't end up being chosen, hopefully you can reach out to an IAPP KnowledgeNet volunteer and try to get your topic on the agenda of one of those great meetings.
We must, as a community, keep on talking about these important issues and we can't let our disinterested politicians and news media discourage us, right?
Kris Klein, CIPP/C, CIPM, FIP, is the managing director for Canada for the IAPP.