At the institute.

• Author: Bailey, Tracey M.

Privacy, law and policy are increasingly becoming the focus of media coverage and, of course, academic discourse. Profound debate arises in these forums largely because two fundamental values, social security and individual autonomy, are sometimes pitted against each other.

Matters such as anti-terrorism legislation and pubic health surveillance bear weighty global implications. The use and oversight of geo-locational technologies and radio tags for travel profile building and location tracking varies significantly among countries. Management and containment of infectious diseases such as SARS, West Nile Virus, Avian Flu, CJD (Mad Cow), Ebola virus and other highly infectious "superbugs", encroach on multiple dimensions of individual privacy; quarantine measures affect personal or spatial privacy while mandatory reporting influences informational privacy.

At the domestic level, the appropriateness of Cabinet secrecy is an example where privacy interests are fueling significant debate. Demands for openness in relation to Cabinet records have increased awareness and sparked review of both federal and provincial information access legislation. The benefits and risks of adopting of a national identity card is also a pressing issue for Canadians.

Accepting that privacy threats and actual breaches will persist despite earnest attempts to safeguard information, the question of organizational accountability arises. Recent U.S. legislative and judicial developments are imposing on organizations a duty to notify individuals of improper disclosures of, and unauthorized access to, personal...