Office of the Saskatchewan Information and Privacy Commissioner. Guide to FOIP, Chapter 6, Protection of Privacy. Updated 27 February 2023. 3 information collected by them to those for which it was obtained; see, for example, the Privacy Act, S.C. 1980-81-82-83, c. 111. 23. One further general point must be made, and that is that if the privacy of the individual is to be protected, we cannot afford to wait to vindicate it only after it has been violated. This is inherent in the notion of being secure against unreasonable searches and seizures. Invasions of privacy must be prevented, and where privacy is outweighed by other societal claims, there must be clear rules setting forth the conditions in which it can be violated … Here again, Dickson J. made this clear in Hunter v. Southam Inc. After repeating that the purpose of s. 8 of the Charter was to protect individuals against unjustified state intrusion, he continued at p. 160: That purpose requires a means of preventing unjustified searches before they happen, not simply of determining, after the fact, whether they ought to have occurred in the first place. This, in my view, can only be accomplished by a system of prior authorization, not one of subsequent validation.4 Privacy is regarded as a fundamental right that is essential to safeguard the autonomy and dignity of an individual.5 Privacy is protected in FOIP by: • Giving individuals a right of access to their own personal information and the opportunity to request corrections to it (s. 31 and s. 32). • Requiring government institutions to collect personal information only where authorized by law (s. 25). • Requiring government institutions to collect personal information directly from the individual, unless where authorized to collect it indirectly (s. 26). • Requiring government institutions to inform individuals of the purpose for which the information is collected (when collected directly) (s. 26(2)). • Requiring that government institutions use personal information that is accurate and complete when making a decision about an individual (s. 27). • Requiring government institutions to establish policies and procedures to maintain administrative, technical and physical safeguards for personal information (s. 24.1). • Limiting a government institution’s use and disclosure of personal information to the purpose for which it was collected, a consistent purpose, another purpose with consent or a purpose set out in FOIP (s. 28). 4 R. v. Dyment, 1988 CanLII 10 (SCC), [1988] 2 SCR 417 at [22] and [23]. 5 SK OIPC Investigation Report F-2005-001 at [22].
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