Electronic Commerce
Act, 2000, Bill 88, Mr Flaherty / Loi
de 2000 sur le commerce électronique, projet de loi
88, M. Flaherty
Communitech
Association
Ms Sangeeta Sindwani
Mr Joshua
Doig
E-Witness Inc; Mytec
Technologies Inc
Ms Janet Hebbes
Mr Don Waugh
STANDING COMMITTEE ON
JUSTICE AND SOCIAL POLICY
Chair /
Présidente
Ms Marilyn Mushinski (Scarborough Centre / -Centre
PC)
Vice-Chair / Vice-Président
Mr Carl DeFaria (Mississauga East / -Est PC)
Mr Marcel Beaubien (Lambton-Kent-Middlesex PC)
Mr Michael Bryant (St Paul's L)
Mr Carl DeFaria (Mississauga East / -Est PC)
Mrs Brenda Elliott (Guelph-Wellington PC)
Mr Garry J. Guzzo (Ottawa West-Nepean / Ottawa-Ouest-Nepean
PC)
Mr Peter Kormos (Niagara Centre / -Centre ND)
Mrs Lyn McLeod (Thunder Bay-Atikokan L)
Ms Marilyn Mushinski (Scarborough Centre / -Centre
PC)
Substitutions / Membres remplaçants
Mr Tony Martin (Sault Ste Marie ND)
Mr Gerry Martiniuk (Cambridge PC)
Mr Mario Sergio (York West / -Ouest L)
Mr Wayne Wettlaufer (Kitchener Centre / -Centre PC)
Also taking part / Autres participants et
participantes
Mr John Gregory, general counsel,
Ministry of the Attorney General
Clerk / Greffière
Ms Susan Sourial
Staff / Personnel
Mr Avrum Fenson, research officer,
Research and Information Services
The committee met at 1201 in the Ron Eydt Village
Conference Centre, University of Waterloo, Waterloo.
ELECTRONIC COMMERCE ACT, 2000 / LOI DE 2000 SUR LE
COMMERCE ÉLECTRONIQUE
Consideration of Bill 88, An
Act to promote the use of information technology in commercial
and other transactions by resolving legal uncertainties and
removing statutory barriers that affect electronic communication
/ Projet de loi 88, Loi visant à promouvoir l'utilisation
des technologies de l'information dans les opérations
commerciales et autres en éliminant les incertitudes
juridiques et les obstacles législatifs qui ont une
incidence sur les communications électroniques.
The Chair (Ms Marilyn
Mushinski): I will call the meeting to order. Good
afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is a meeting of the
standing committee on justice and social policy to consider Bill
88, An Act to promote the use of information technology in
commercial and other transactions by resolving legal
uncertainties and removing statutory barriers that affect
electronic communication.
Before we hear from the first
delegate this afternoon, I should bring you up to date on our
inquiries with respect to the two outstanding delegations in
Ottawa. I was instructed by committee to cancel that meeting
because we only had two. We have been in touch with those two
delegates. The first one is Mr Michael Geist, who has chosen to
withdraw completely. My understanding is that he is an expert
witness and he would be happy to entertain any questions that any
committee members may have. So we'll certainly give you his
telephone number after the meeting if you wish it.
The other delegate was the
Public Interest Advocacy Centre. They will be submitting a
written submission by the end of the week and, again, will be
happy to entertain any questions that any members may have of
them.
COMMUNITECH ASSOCIATION
The Chair:
We'll hear from the first representative this morning, who is
Sangeeta Sindwani of Communitech Association.
Mr Mario Sergio (York
West): Madam Chair, have we provided for an overview
before, or are we going directly into-
The Chair:
My understanding is that it was a request by one of the
presenters and will be used a little later.
Mr Sergio:
Oh, OK.
The Chair:
Good afternoon, Ms Sindwani. You have half an hour and if you
complete early then we may be able to have some questions from
members of committee.
Ms Sangeeta
Sindwani: I'm pleased to have been invited to speak to
this standing committee concerning Bill 88, Ontario's Electronic
Commerce Act.
The Chair:
Excuse me. This is kind of noisy, so if there's any opportunity
to-and I realize it may have to be on during the presentation,
but it's difficult to hear. Please carry on.
Ms Sindwani:
I'm especially pleased that this standing committee has come to
Canada's technology triangle to solicit various views on this
bill. I've been asked by Greg Barratt, the president of the
Communitech Technology Association, to speak to the topic of Bill
88 and to express Communitech's support for this bill.
By way of background, the
Communitech Technology Association is an organization dedicated
to building critical mass for the technology industry real
enterprise in the Kitchener-Waterloo region. It has as its
members technology companies, educational institutions and
various levels of government, all working together toward the
continued development of the technology industry in this area,
both as providers and users of technology.
In terms of my history, my
involvement in the area of electronic commerce has been as a
lawyer in private practice, advising clients on issues related to
information technology law, which I think is an area that's quite
broad and covers the realm of electronic commerce.
In 1998, I joined the
electronic commerce working group of the Uniform Law Conference
of Canada, a group that was responsible for the development of
uniform law in the area of electronic commerce. The group
developed, as I'm sure you're all aware, the Uniform Electronic
Commerce Act which is actually very similar to the bill we're
here to discuss today. At present, I am an associate with the law
firm of Gowling Lafleur Henderson.
At the outset, I should state
that Communitech has not had any specific consultations with any
of its members concerning
this bill. However, generally it has had general consultations in
the past with its members and has been able to get a good feel
for what is happening within the Kitchener-Waterloo community. It
was therefore felt that it would be better to express an opinion
or a general view on Bill 88 as opposed to remaining silent on
such an important initiative.
The support that is being
expressed here today on behalf of Communitech is support for what
we see as the intention behind Bill 88, that being the removal of
a few roadblocks toward the full adoption of electronic commerce.
In other words, we support law that removes legal barriers to
electronic commerce by validating electronic documents and by
increasing confidence and predictability in the result of
transacting on-line without dictating the type of technology that
is to be used to do this.
The concept of increasing
confidence in the legal effect of on-line transactions is an
important one and we feel that this bill is a step toward this
goal because it really removes the legal ambiguity as to whether
something that was traditionally done using paper can now be
accomplished electronically.
As a participant in the
Canadian E-Business Opportunities Roundtable, Communitech has had
the opportunity to accumulate various data on electronic
commerce. The roundtable consists of a group of industry leaders,
including John Wetmore of IBM Canada and John Roth of Nortel
Networks, who have with the other participants presented a report
to Industry Canada on accelerating Canada's leadership in the
Internet economy. Part of the data that has been accumulated for
this report is the Statistics Canada survey on the use of
information and communication technologies in electronic
commerce. The results of the survey show that Canada is second
only to the United States in world rankings of overall
connectedness to the Internet. The government of Canada has
publicly stated that its goal is to be the most connected country
in the world, and with the statistics I've just mentioned it
appears that we are fast approaching that goal.
Communitech's vision is
similar in that the Kitchener-Waterloo region is a hotbed for
technology companies and would only benefit from increased
connectivity to the Internet. Establishing law that validates
electronic documents will likely reduce public apprehension to
performing transactions on-line and will assist in bestowing
greater confidence in this revolutionary way of conducting
business. It's anticipated that this will further our efforts
toward the goal of greater connectivity, both on a local and
global scale.
Despite high connectivity
rates here in Canada, there still appears to be a slow adoption
of electronic commerce in both the business-to-consumer and
business-to-business markets. Statistics show that only 10% of
private sector firms use the Internet to sell goods and less than
14% of private sector firms use the Internet for purchasing.
These numbers are somewhat disappointing given that our
population is highly connected, as well as the fact that there's
been key infrastructure in place for communicating
electronically. These statistics reflect our own local experience
here in this region.
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At present, therefore, it
appears that the majority of the private sector just doesn't feel
comfortable enough with the Internet to use it as a medium for
conducting business. By providing a legal framework to validate
electronic documents, this initiative may accelerate the adoption
of electronic commerce by the private sector.
The minimalist approach taken
by this bill is viewed favourably by Communitech. Many of the
technology companies that exist in this region are on the cutting
edge in terms of products and services they offer. They may not
want to see legislation that prescribes specific technology to be
used in the validation of electronic documents. Such legislation
could stifle the development of new technology. Bill 88 does not
prescribe specific technology, which is really in keeping with
the concept of continuous development and improvement in
technology.
Based on my own background
and knowledge in this area, I am familiar with certain legal
initiatives that have been taking place in Canada and around the
world. Internationally, there is a recognition that consensus is
required among countries developing laws in this area. The goal
is really not to have identical laws, but to have the same
philosophies and principles operating behind these laws.
The Uniform Law Conference of
Canada is a body within our own country with a mandate to
harmonize laws throughout Canada. This organization viewed
electronic commerce as an area requiring consistency among the
provinces, and therefore has adopted a uniform law on electronic
commerce. At the federal level, as we are all aware, Bill C-6,
the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act,
has now been passed and is similar to the uniform law. Bill 88 is
also similar to the uniform law and, from a policy perspective,
is what many other countries are doing in an attempt to remove
legal barriers to electronic commerce.
That really concludes our
support statement before the standing committee. As a
representative of Communitech, I've been asked to raise a few
points for consideration by the committee. I don't know if it's
appropriate at this moment that I go ahead and do that.
The Chair:
That's quite appropriate.
Ms Sindwani:
First, it has been expressed by the Ministry of the Attorney
General in their fact sheet to the Electronic Commerce Act that
the bill does not permit people to collect biometric information,
such as dynamic signature information. Can somebody from the
panel clarify the meaning of "dynamic signature"?
The Chair:
What you should do is relay all of your outstanding concerns to
committee, and then perhaps we can have a member of committee
respond to them.
Ms Sindwani:
That would be the first question. I guess where Communitech is
coming from is just to ensure that the use of digital signatures
is not being prohibited.
The president of Communitech as well as myself were not able to
answer that question, and that's why I raise it.
Second, in the same fact
sheet it is stated by way of exclusion that the act "does not
override existing provincial laws and regulations that permit,
regulate or prohibit the use of electronic documents."
Communitech would like to know what the reasoning is behind
allowing other laws to override this bill. Practically speaking,
by using this exclusion are we moving forward or are we at the
same point we have been without any legislation in place?
Those are the comments that
the president has asked to relay.
The Chair:
That's it?
Ms Sindwani:
That's it.
The Chair:
We have about 15 minutes, so each person can have maybe five
minutes for questions. Mr Martin.
Mr Tony Martin (Sault
Ste Marie): Could I suggest, in the interests of
answering those two questions, because I certainly would be
interested in the answer, that either the gentleman who presented
yesterday or our research person might just take a couple of
minutes and give it a shot?
The Chair:
Mr Gregory, would you like to just very briefly respond?
Mr John
Gregory: Thank you, Madam Chair. There were two
questions. The first was, what is meant by dynamic signature?
The Chair:
Or biometric information.
Mr Gregory:
I'm trying to remember just what the-
Ms Sindwani:
Would you like the fact sheet?
Mr Gregory:
No, I know what the fact sheet says. Anyway, the short answer is
that this is not intended to prevent digital signatures. As the
Teranet representative explained to the committee yesterday,
digital signatures are a use of encryption technology and
mathematical algorithms in order to transform a digital version
of the message. It has nothing to do with biometrics, which of
course deals with the measurement of personal
characteristics.
In defining "biometric
information," section 29 of Bill 88 says it's "information
derived from an individual's unique personal characteristics,
other than a representation of his or her photograph or
signature." So that is a representation of a photograph or
signature. If someone uses a digital photograph as your
identifier, that is not biometric. It may be biometric
technically, by the dictionary definition, but we are not trying
to get at that in the provision of the biometric thing. It
doesn't apply to biometrics. If someone takes your picture or
uses a digitized picture as an identifier, that doesn't fall into
the provision of biometric information in the act.
Likewise, a dynamic signature
is the kind of signature created when you sign a
computer-sensitive pad. For example, a number of department
stores have done that, where you don't sign with a pen but you
sign with something that feels like a pen, a stylus. You sign on
a computerized pad and that records not only the shape of your
signature-you sign what would normally be your signature if you
were doing it with pen and ink-but it is a computer-sensitive pad
and you get not only the picture but you get the pressure and the
speed and the angles recorded. So you have much more information
than you have with an ink-on-paper signature. That is recorded in
a computer and that is associated with the document that you
signed, so that can be reproduced. If someone were to say, "Show
me the signed document," they can pull it up on a computer screen
and there it is with your signature on it. But as I say, there is
more information than simply what looks like your signature. That
is fairly common.
That is excluded from the
provision on biometrics. The reason for that is simply that it's
very hard to do that accidentally. The point of the biometric
provision, as we heard yesterday, was to say there has to be
express consent to the use. It may well be possible to take
biometric information from somebody without their really
realizing how it's done. There are computer mouse devices which
read your fingerprint as you use them. Someone might use one of
those without really realizing that that was happening. Or if
someone does a voice recognition pickup, that can happen without
your really realizing that's what they're doing. It's very
difficult to sign on a pad without realizing what they're doing.
So it limits the application of the biometric provision by
saying, "All right, if they use a picture, then they can use a
picture." It's not particularly intrusive to use a picture. It's
on my driver's licence. It's a fairly common kind of thing, and
for a dynamic signature it's not a problem.
The other reason-and I'm not
sure how technical you want to get-is something we talked about
with the Information and Privacy Commissioner. One of the
concerns with the use of biometrics that was expressed by the
Information and Privacy Commissioner was that the data, the
biometric information that the computer picks up, might be used
to find you, might be able to identify you, identify a criminal,
identify someone in a database to find out whether there's a
fraud or whatever. They want to identify you not just to say, "Do
I have the right to withdraw money," or whatever, but more
broadly. With dynamic signature, you can't really use it for that
purpose.
I won't impinge on Ms
Sindwani's time, but the other question was, if this act yields
to other provincial laws that prohibit electronic information,
isn't that a threat to the purpose of the act, which is to
harmonize and modernize? That's something we did discuss
yesterday, both in my presentation and in some of the other
presentations.
1220
The point is that there are
several hundred provincial statutes that have not had provisions
made for electronic documents and we don't want to amend them
all. This saves us amending them all. Harmonizing what's been
done is a very difficult diplomatic process among ministries. We
may eventually do it, but we figured if we had to do that first it would be years before
we get the new-
The Chair:
Thank you, Mr Gregory. Mr Sergio, do you have any questions?
Mr Sergio: A
question and a comment, yes indeed. First of all, thanks for
coming down and making a presentation to this committee. Other
than what you expressed to us today, was there any other area
that you or your company may have a concern about with the
bill?
Ms Sindwani:
No. I was asked to express those two concerns and I've done so.
I've had consultations with the president of Communitech. Like I
said, in the short time span that we were given there was really
little time to consult the members of Communitech, so this is a
general view that's being provided. What I've expressed here
today is basically an expression of his thoughts on the bill.
Mr Sergio:
Given the shortness of time, did you notice in the bill, for
example, that there is no mention at all with respect to privacy
or confidentiality issues?
Ms Sindwani:
Yes.
Mr Sergio:
Is that one of your concerns?
Ms Sindwani:
No. Again, when I speak or give any type of opinion, I'm speaking
personally; I'm not speaking on behalf of my employer. Because of
the time span, there was no opportunity to take a view of what
the other lawyers in my firm or the members of Communitech think.
I think it's a separate issue that can be dealt with separately.
I don't see that it would be necessary to include it in this type
of bill.
Mr Sergio:
If it were to be included in some other piece of legislation, do
you think, at least in dealing with such an important issue as
Bill 88, that we should have made mention of that to cover the
possible effect that it may have in the future under a different
piece of legislation-the issue of privacy and
confidentiality?
Ms Sindwani:
I think it is in some respect covered in this bill in that
there's mention of it, which is better than no mention at all, in
my opinion, and that's just the statement that there's
preservation of other laws regarding privacy and access to
information, and that would give way to those types of laws that
actually protect privacy of individuals. Insofar as it goes that
far, I think that would be good; any further, I don't know how,
other than drafting a section that deals with privacy. I don't
know, other than that, how to go about mentioning it better than
it has been here. Again, that's my personal view.
Mr Martin:
Certainly we picked up the message that you want this to move on
so that it will give people out there the confidence they need.
You also highlighted that in Ontario and Canada today the
percentage of people actually doing business in this way is still
minimal. I can tell you that from some of the material we've
looked at it, the complaints about e-commerce by consumers have
risen by about 1,000% over the last year or so, so there are
still some big issues out there.
This is a very important
initiative. I guess the question I would have for you is, in
trying to establish this on a foundation that's solid and will
give people the confidence that they need, and actually
reflecting the fact you're coming here today not having had much
lead time to consult with your partners and all of that, wouldn't
it make more sense to actually be doing a wider consultation on
this in order to bring people into the discussion and, as such,
then have them understand more fully the potential that's here
but also some of the challenges that are in this that might, in
the end, if we're not careful, even add more to the frustration
and consternation and concern of people out there who actually
try to do this?
Once this is passed, and it
sounds like it's going to move rather quickly, then it's legal to
do business in this way. If people aren't educated and prepared
to actually participate in a constructive and positive way in
that, they will have signed a whole lot of documents now that
initially were sort of iffy and so you at least had some recourse
if you made a mistake or you didn't think it out properly, but
now it's done and you're stuck. That could be quite a surprise
and create some real difficulties, it seems to me, in the
industry. Any comment?
Ms Sindwani:
I think certainly education is a key factor in something this
important. I can speak as well just from my own client base that
I would benefit from, or the Kitchener-Waterloo region
specifically, as I speak to that, would benefit from knowing a
little bit more about the act and the initiative, as opposed to
remaining ignorant and then finding out later that this is law. I
think what we're doing here today is a good step toward that
because you bring members forward who can speak to it and then
spread the word.
I'm not sure what the process
was in terms of choosing areas in which this bill would be
presented by members of the various communities. I don't know the
thought process behind that. But certainly in terms of canvassing
other cities and other jurisdictions within Ontario, I don't see
an issue. But at the same time, I think I can also say that those
within the technology industry would certainly welcome something
on paper-more than something on paper-with the intention of
validating electronic documents, but within a reasonable amount
of time, because this is a fast-paced industry and obviously
taking time to get consultations may slow down the process. It
would certainly help in terms of educating, but at the same time,
saying that electronic documents are valid within certain
parameters is, in my view in terms of my clients, helpful in
terms of moving forward. I don't know if I've specifically
answered your question, but that's my answer to it.
Mr Martin:
Thank you.
The Chair:
Mr Wettlaufer, for about two minutes.
Mr Wayne Wettlaufer
(Kitchener Centre): Ms Sindwani, thank you for your
submission. You mentioned in your submission that, while Canada
has the second-highest connectivity rate, second only to the
United States, we still only have 10% of sales conducted by
e-commerce, and 14% of purchases.
Ms Sindwani:
That's right.
Mr Wettlaufer: That's a rather
alarming figure. There is also a very low percentage of
business-to-business transactions. I'm not sure what the figures
are there offhand, but I know they are low.
You did mention lack of
confidence as being one factor. Would there be any other factors
that you can bring to mind for the attention of this committee,
and do you believe this bill will assist in increasing the
transactions and also increasing the business-to-business
transactions?
Ms Sindwani:
I'll answer your second question first. I think, yes, having this
bill would increase predictability, as I've said, and confidence
in terms of the results of transacting on-line, which I think
Canadian society is a little apprehensive of to begin with, more
so than the United States. Again, that's a personal view. Having
something in place will instill this confidence, it's hoped, and
help us move forward, and I think the bill does that.
In terms of the reasons that
business-to-business e-commerce is slow, I have a Statistics
Canada survey here in front of me-not the survey but actually a
brief summation of some of the things that come out of it. It is
stated that some of the reasons private sector firms do not use
e-commerce are that they believe the goods and services do not
lend themselves to electronic commerce, they prefer to maintain
current business models, and there are concerns regarding
security. Those are three of the other reasons that I've come
across.
The Chair:
Thank you very much, Ms Sindwani, for coming this afternoon. We
appreciate your presentation.
1230
JOSHUA DOIG
The Chair:
The next delegate is Joshua Doig. Good afternoon, Mr Doig. You
have 15 minutes.
Mr Joshua
Doig: I'm sorry I didn't have anything written down, but
I have a statement I'd like to read off, background about
myself.
My name is Joshua Doig. I
work here at the university. I am just a recent graduate, in
April. I have been very interested on a personal level in the
technology sector in general-not, maybe, specifically
e-commerce-because I've seen at least 12 of my graduating
comrades leave the country for greener pastures down south. It
seems to be limited very much to the technology sector. Also,
there seem to be a lot of regulatory problems in Canada that
inhibit their starting up their own businesses. E-commerce might
not be directly applicable to all that because there are
broad-based concerns there, but it is one portion of the problem.
So I am very much in support of this bill to try to help
facilitate technology and acquisition in the growth of the
technology centre in Canada.
I did a number of studies in
my last year-I was in economics-on why people are leaving, what
the problem is and why in this particular sector. That got my own
personal involvement in here. I think we should be very concerned
about Canada's competitiveness in this region, our government
support in this region, and why we're losing. The growth all
around the world is in the new technology, the new jobs, and our
governments need to be supportive of this industry and help it
grow. If we fall behind, we'll just continue to fall behind at an
aggregate level that increases.
If you change e-commerce to
make it easy and more legal at a rate where we can move forward
with that, you not only have more companies feel better about
doing it on-line; you help the consumer, because he knows that
what he is signing is a legal document, and therefore the company
should come through. Once you do that, you have more companies
wanting to go on-line, if they feel secure about it. They would
then hire more people. The people who need to service this kind
of technology are very skilled. You would create more jobs, and
hopefully some Canadian companies would get on board a bit
quicker.
There was an article in the
paper yesterday that said the second biggest barrier to doing an
IPO with a high-technology firm in Canada was government
regulation. I'm sure that tends to be more indicative of the
actual progress of doing your IPO, but it's also reflective of
problems we are having in Canada with government regulation.
Instead of the government trying to support this stuff, they seem
to be cautious and not sure what they want to do, so consequently
nothing is getting done quickly. Our government needs to respond
quickly to keep pace with this kind of thing. It is still written
documents, and people need to know that it is legal all around. I
think you clarify a lot of issues if we all know that what we are
signing is legal.
Anything that would encourage
adopting the technology sector quicker is better for our economy.
Our young people, who continue to leave, need government support.
They are on-line with this technology already. The government
needs to catch up with them and help them out. That's where I'm
coming at it from, not so much the legal but more the economic
impact, especially with young people trying to get involved and
company-to-company, and then fostering growth in this sector.
I think that's my statement,
if you have any questions.
The Chair:
Thank you, Mr Doig.
Mr Martin, you have about
three and a half minutes.
Mr Martin: I
agree that we need to be moving as aggressively as we can to make
sure we actually, in some instances, get out in front as opposed
to always playing catch-up. Certainly this whole area is one that
is just flying ahead in many parts of the world.
However, I think you have to
do it intelligently, and I think government has a role to play to
make sure that people are protected and that we are supporting an
industry that is sustainable and as inclusive as possible of all
parts of your jurisdiction.
For example, I said a few
minutes ago that, according to the Ministry of Consumer and
Commercial Relations, complaints about e-commerce have risen by
about 1,000% over the last year or so. And that's with a
statistic of, as was said earlier-except I've got some slightly
different statistics. Stats Canada released a benchmark study on August 10 which said
that goods and services ordered by Canadians on the Internet in
1999 represented only 0.2% or $4.4 billion of total economic
activity, about 20 cents out of every $100. However, there are
some sectors that are doing more business. The cultural
industries have done 20% of business using the Internet; private
educational services, 17%. But in the area of the province that I
represent, northern Ontario, which still continues to be very
much tied into forestry, logging and mining and resource-based
activity, we're looking at probably 1%.
I guess what I'm wondering
about in this rush to be in front and to be first and to take
advantage of this is, are there not some things that we need to
make sure that we're doing to, on one hand, include all parts of
the province, the north in particular, and rural Ontario, and on
the other hand, to make sure that we're not setting people up to
be taken advantage of? Is that not a role the government should
be playing? Or, if they're not going to play it, who's going to
play it as this industry evolves as it looks like it's going
to?
Mr Doig:
An interesting couple of points: the complaints have risen
1,000%; I wonder what the facts are on how much the volume has
risen in the same time period. That would be neat to
cross-reference. But, at the same time, some sectors may
never-forestry may never get on to the Internet, but that doesn't
mean you should slow it down for the industries that are trying
to get on. I think you be inclusive by designing a system that
anybody can get on at any time. Some sectors may never, ever use
this but some sectors definitely need to use it. I think that
you're actually probably helping the consumer very much by making
it a legal document because it's often the consumer that suffers
because I enter into a contract with a business, I don't get the
product that I was told I was going to get through this contract
and my legal recourses are fuzzy right now because what
obligations does the company have? I think if you want to protect
the consumer, that's great.
As far as educating the
public, the public should be aware of their legal obligations
already. It's just like any other issue. I just graduated from
university. I sign a contract to be a tenant very often; I move
around. I might not be aware of every issue involved there; I
tend to educate myself when I need to. But the information should
be made available for me and it is my responsibility to check it
out ahead of time. I think, as long as you're clear with
everybody that this is a legal document, as long as everybody is
made aware of that, that education should be
self-responsible.
Mr
Wettlaufer: Mr Doig, we have the University of Waterloo
here, which is turning out graduates of extremely high quality,
the highest in the world. We're very proud of that. We're proud
of the graduates and we're proud of the university.
Companies like Mortice
Kerns are leaders in the e-commerce area, but we are finding all
the time that in spite of the graduates we're turning out, we do
not have adequate numbers of top-notch, high-tech graduates to
work in the companies, to help these companies grow, whether it
be Mortice Kerns or Research in Motion or Open Text or on and on.
We find, and I'm sure you do too, that so many of what are called
"techies" are moving to the United States. Now the federal
government tells us that that is not the case, and certainly we
have heard the opposition members from time to time say that is
not the case. In the government budget that was presented in May
of this year, we provided an incentive for the tech graduates to
stay in Canada when we said that the stock options that they
would receive from their companies would no longer be taxed upon
receipt but rather when they were sold at some point down the
road. Of course, the federal government has opposed us in that
regard as well.
Do you agree that we are
having many of our brightest graduates leaving to go to the
United States for what they see as a brighter field because of
taxes or because of something like this bill?
1240
Mr Doig:
Without a doubt. I did a lot of research especially on the
StatsCan information that was released about a year ago that
claimed that we don't have a brain drain. How they did their
figures was they took what we had coming in as kind of techie or
medicine and they put it against what we had leaving, a kind of
exodus, and they came up pretty close, that we're only losing a
couple of hundred.
I found there are two
really scary issues with that. One is that there was no measure
of the quality of the people who were leaving versus the quality
of the people we were getting. They just classified that they had
a degree of some sort from somewhere and where we might have been
losing people who already had started companies and were running
things. Second of all, the scariest thing is that we as Canadians
tend to think, "Oh, Jeez, we're only losing 100. We might be
losing 1,000 but we're gaining 900; not to worry." What you are
losing is a huge potential. It should be looked at as, "Wow, we
could have kept 1,000 and got an extra 900," so we could have
been plus 1,900. This industry, as you said, is growing so
rapidly, an extra 1,900 would just be a nickel or a dime in the
pocket.
So the way StatsCan and the
federal government currently do it is that they don't seem to be
recognizing that we're still losing potential. I mean, we could
have had 1,900. "Well, good. We're close to even. Excellent." It
seemed ridiculous to me, with the reports they had out, and we're
definitely losing. Not only that, if you lose a couple of key
people-if you look at companies like RIM, they were only started
by two or three individuals.
A friend of mine who wanted
to start a company here couldn't get venture capital. He made
sound equipment that's called Quinnware for your computer. You
could download it; it's like a CD player. He couldn't find
venture capital. He hired one person here in Kitchener-Waterloo,
he got a venture capital offer from San Francisco, he left, and
now the company he works for-he has a little division of it
now-employs about 15. You lost one, but the problem is that you really
lost 15 people, all the tax revenue they would have been able to
pay in the community, the houses they bought, the cars they
bought, the CD players they bought and everything else they would
have bought, not to mention the skills they would have garnered
through this company that would enable them to start their own
company one day.
I think we're definitely
suffering a huge amount of brain drain. Not only that, it tends
to be the best and brightest who get picked off. I'm still here
in Canada. I did not take a technology degree and an American
company doesn't want me. I had some very bright, very aggressive
friends, much more entrepreneurial than I am, and they're gone.
They're the kinds of guys you probably needed to have around to
have a strong economy and the education sector and every other
thing that the economy can derive money from.
Mr
Wettlaufer: You sound pretty brave to me.
Mr Doig: I
should have gone into technology.
The Chair:
Mr Sergio, you have about two and a half minutes.
Mr Sergio:
Joshua, thanks for coming down. That is a separate issue for
another time.
What we are dealing with
today, Bill 88, is to promote the use of information technology
in commercial and other transactions by resolving legal
uncertainties and removing-I'm reading the heading of the bill
itself. So there are two particular things. One is to support
this technology, which I think we all agree is about time. The
other is that it's about time that we do it right at the same
time because, as you say, it affects the bottom line, the
consumers, and of course the users as well. Those are the two
main intents of the legislation as it is presented.
We Liberals see a need for
that as well and we'll support that, but we'd like to see it done
right so that the government doesn't come up six months from now
to introduce another piece of legislation that will take care of
other areas, as they will. We believe there should be room in
this legislation now that takes care indeed of how this new
commercial information technology will affect the users and the
consumers at the end. That is our problem.
For example, I believe
there should be a tie-in there with respect to privacy,
confidentiality and even how it may affect the powers of the
Integrity Commissioner, that the powers of that commission, for
example, will not be affected by this piece of legislation. If
they are not included in Bill 88, how will we manage to safeguard
those privacy and confidentiality issues, including the powers of
the commissioner?
We do support it, but I
believe those are issues we should be dealing with to make sure
that when we go into the marketplace we use it not only
conveniently, safely and properly but also in a legal manner,
that we do not affect either the welfare or the benefits of the
end users nor infringe on the confidentiality and privacy of
those people as well.
Have you had enough time to
look at Bill 88 with respect to those specific issues?
The Chair:
You have 30 seconds.
Mr Doig: I
looked it over quite a bit. We already have a legal
infrastructure, I believe, to take care of it. Second, I think
that sometimes you have to move forward and some of these things
will become available to you. It's sometimes better to move
forward and find some mistakes and correct them then than not to
move forward for months and months on end and a lot of people
suffer.
Third, I think that with
privacy it sometimes gets blown out of proportion in the Internet
sphere. If you go into a store like Gap and you buy a piece of
clothing and you pay with your credit card, they have your
information. Nothing safeguards you from a regular commerce act.
They have your information, they have you on file as a customer,
and they can do what they want with it. It could be the same,
that you don't need to have any extra protection through
e-commerce. The privacy act should be separate, in that if I
visit a site just to visit it, you shouldn't be able to get my
information. That's a different issue, not to do with e-commerce.
With e-commerce it shouldn't be any greater privacy than you
already have when you go down to the local hardware store, or
whatever you want to do, and purchase, and I think that should be
taken care of. If you think the local hardware shouldn't be able
to sell your information or keep you on file, then that's a much
broader context than this bill.
The Chair:
Thank you very much, Mr Doig.
1250
E-WITNESS INC
MYTEC TECHNOLOGIES INC
The Chair:
The next presenters are Janet Hebbes and Don Waugh of E-Witness
and Mytec Technologies. Good afternoon.
Mr Don
Waugh: I'd like to thank the committee for allowing us
to do this presentation today. We are the last presenting
group?
The Chair:
Yes.
Mr Waugh:
We moved forward. Would we be able to take a little bit more
time?
The Chair:
All of the delegations have been given half an hour, so if you
can try to keep it within half an hour, we'd appreciate it. If
you go a little over, I'm sure that we have a very flexible
committee.
Mr Waugh:
Thank you very much. I appreciate that.
We have a little agenda
just to give you an outline of how we're going to approach this
today. First, we thought we'd introduce ourselves and then talk
about an application of the technology into a specific area. Of
prime importance was to address confidentiality issues and then
we wanted to review what PKI, digital signature technology, is
and represents, in that it certainly is a technology that has
been around for 20 years, to tell you the truth, and how it does
provide protection to the consumer, protection that does not
exist today.
Finally, we wanted to move
into a demonstration of the technology that was developed by two
Canadian companies, and we hope to be able to take a leadership
position in the
marketplace, and then to review the proposed legislation and some
impediments to our success that we would like to have considered
by the committee, if that's OK with you.
To introduce E-Witness, our
roots actually go back to one of the centres of excellence,
CRESTech, which is the Centre for Research in Earth and Space
Technology. This centre of excellence actually helped establish
the Internet in Canada back in 1988. Our company, Cool Water
Internet Design-we have developed for a number of companies, but
what has happened is that we have developed a technology that
addressed some of the requirements or solving a problem for
allowing doctors to prescribe medicine over the Internet. Rather
than hide this in Cool Water as an Internet company, we have
established a separate company called E-Witness to capitalize on
this technology, bringing it to the marketplace, the Internet
space, and delivering a full PKI solution through a standard Web
browser, which I'll tell you more about later.
We've also included
biometrics in our implementation with our partner, Mytec, and
that's led to our first joint venture, the establishment of
Pharma Trust, which is a trust that will allow doctors to
prescribe medicine over the Internet.
I'd like to turn things
over to Janet, who will just give you a little bit of background
about Mytec.
Ms Janet
Hebbes: Good afternoon, Madam Chair and committee
members. My name is Janet Hebbes and I'm director of business
development with Mytec Technologies. Mytec is a biometric firm.
We decided to concentrate on fingerprints as the biometric that
identifies you as an individual. John Gregory spoke just a few
moments ago and was identifying that it could be either an iris
scan or a face scan or voice recognition. One thing to qualify is
that when you're using Mytec and their product-like the brand
Campbell soup; their brand is called Bioscrypt-you will always
know when you are giving your fingerprint. You will never be
mistaken in giving your fingerprint without your knowing.
Mytec is a Canadian
company. Two gentlemen who started out of Chubb security
developed an alarm system company called Counter Force. Many of
you may actually have it in your homes. It's a private security
system. This was started in 1988. The company went public on the
TSE in 1993. This year we sold off Counter Force for about $28
million. This was the cash cow that was sponsoring a lot of
research and development for Mytec for our biometrics. We are
going to the market with biometrics and our Bioscrypt as our
algorithm, our software, and we're focusing on many of the
different solutions, one of which John and his company have taken
up.
I think everybody right now
is very familiar with the different ways that you can
authenticate who you are. If you take a look at this slide, many
of us have PINs, personal identification numbers. This allows us
access to our banks and to our credit cards. If you're in the
office, you have to type in a password and you have to remember
that password. In high security areas it could be very long, 120
digits. You sometimes have to write it down. We all have the
debit cards. Those first two things are only as good as you
protect them. If you lend it to someone or if it's stolen, that's
how fraud happens. With the biometric, we use your fingerprint.
It's very secure and it only authenticates that it's you.
That big word down there,
non-repudiation, I wasn't sure what that was. We're going to get
to that a little bit later so that we have a clear
understanding.
Why biometrics? Biometrics
makes it convenient, it makes it safe and secure, and it offers
non-repudiation. Don's going to show you a little bit later on
this product we have that we're taking out, and it's actually
being used. We call this our Bioscrypt Enterprise. Here's what
happens. Actually, it's very cool. It sounds like a James Bond
thing, not to be glib. What you do is take your fingerprint. What
Mytec uses is called pattern recognition. If you look at your
fingertip, there are thousands of points there. We don't use
minutia, which other competitors do. We make sure that we get a
scan of your fingerprint. You would go through and enrol and say,
"I'm Janet Hebbes." Then what it does is take either the PIN or
the password that you have and it embeds that password into the
scan of your fingerprint. It scrambles it up and it creates a
Bioscrypt, so it's like a piece of the pie, it's like a jigsaw
puzzle. Never, ever is the fingerprint left on the server. What
happens is, when you want to access it, everything is happening
in this one unit, this one device, the Bioscrypt. Nothing is
staying on the server, which means very simply that it's very
non-threatening. There's never an infringement on your personal
identification. That's one of the coolest things they have.
We're using Bioscrypt
Enterprise, and Don's going to show you how he's incorporated
that with his technology. In addition to Enterprise, we're also
moving more into the portable, the m-commerce, mobile commerce.
We're looking at telephones, we're looking at Palm Pilots, we're
looking at Research in Motion, so that when you're walking around
you'll actually have your telephone. If you want to make a trade
you first have to verify that it's you, Janet Hebbes, who's going
to issue 50,000 shares; at 4 pm on the TSE I'm making that
trade.
What is the
non-repudiation? My broker calls me up the next day and says,
"That stock's gone down, Janet, just so that you know, by 50%."
If I try to deny that, they say, "No, we've authenticated it
because it was your fingerprint that actually unlocked the key."
We do this in a very safe and secure manner.
My point in going through
all of this is that for government and for us to understand the
implication for Bill 88, the most important thing is that it's
secure already. This is not about convenience. This is about
security; it's about privacy. This is already being done.
The next point I want to
make is that there is no infringement on the individual, on the
person, so as far as fraud there is no way of ever getting in and
taking that fingerprint. This is why legislation should be passed
so that we can allow not only consumers but businesses in
the business-to-business
section to be able to pass cheques and to do transactions such as
the passing of deeds on-line. The technology is already here.
One of the ways you can see
this-I think it's important for Don to share with you something
he has used in conjunction with PKI, which is Public Key
Infrastructure, not to get bogged down with the background of
technology but to understand, as you've said, Tony, that the
education is already there, it's already secure and it already
looks at privacy.
Mr Waugh:
One of the reasons we've chosen the Mytec device is because it
did protect the fingerprint information. It did not release it.
It actually encrypted it. It's called triple DES encryption,
which means it's indestructible, impregnable. Not even the
largest supercomputer in the world today could penetrate this
script. It means the confidentiality of the user is 100%
guaranteed.
This is a Mytec device.
This device has its own key. It's in the firm where you can't see
it, you can't release it, you can't gain access to it. When you
enrol in this, you create a template of yourself to which to
compare. Once the enrolment has been done, that fingerprint
template is encrypted triple DES under this devices key. This
means the only place you can actually decrypt that file is inside
this device.
Ms Hebbes:
Not on the server.
Mr Waugh:
Not on the server. It's not being passed around. You're not
passing around your biometric information.
When you go to authorize a
transaction, you scan your fingerprint, creating a current value.
It then decrypts the template from when you originally enrolled
and compares the two inside this device. If it is positive, it
will release your private key, releasing it to the on-line
transaction.
We had to be very, very
concerned when we originally developed this because we're dealing
with patient data. There are 266 million prescriptions prescribed
by doctors in Canada every year. You can imagine if that type of
information got released; it would be a catastrophe to people's
lives and professions. It would undermine the whole trust
environment.
1300
This technology in the past
has not been available. The core of PKI has been around, as I
said, for 20 years. It was developed by RSA; RSA is where the
original technology was developed down in the States.
The biometrics has been
developed. What we needed to do was actually deliver it in such a
way that it could be used by a doctor and a pharmacist and that
it would basically address five principles. These principles were
established by colleges of pharmacists across Canada, and those
five principles were:
(1) A method to guarantee
the confidentiality of the patient's information, that it could
not be released to anyone other than the doctor and the
pharmacist-no other person or organization.
(2) There had to be a
method to authenticate the doctor. In Canada, the only persons
who can prescribe medicine are the doctors themselves. They are
licensed by the College of Physicians and Surgeons and one of
their responsibilities is the prescribing of drugs. Because user
names and passwords are so easy to give out-and there are many
situations where the doctor has their user name or password on a
sticky note on the terminal-it's very easy to release that. So
the college required biometrics in order to authenticate the
doctor 100% in the transaction.
(3) There had to be a
method that would ensure the integrity of the script itself so it
would not be subject to modification and duplication, because we
are talking about the distribution of drugs in Canada.
(4) There had to be a
method that would prevent the diversion of the script itself, so
it couldn't be duplicated or diverted to another group,
poly-pharmacying, poly-doctoring.
(5) Finally-and this was
our challenge-we had to deliver this in a completely open
architecture so that any doctor, any pharmacy could participate,
regardless of operating system, regardless of network, regardless
of the applications that they have deployed for managing their
own internal operations. This is what led to the establishment of
our PKI plug-in in a browser technology.
So there are basically two
technologies at work here. One is the PKI; two is the biometrics.
We had a choice of many other biometric companies to choose from.
All the rest, by the way, are in the United States, which is
important to note.
The E-Witness PKI plug-in
for a browser-basically we are developing this in collaboration
with the University of Toronto. Professor Ian Blake is a part of
our algorithm development team. He is one of the leading experts
in elliptic curve algorithm development, as well as standard RSA
algorithms.
We have delivered it
through a browser, which you will see shortly. It's simple to
use. People understand what they're doing. It's being delivered
through a browser. People understand that ubiquitous interface to
many e-commerce applications, which means that it will support
any e-commerce application. This is very important, because today
there is no protection mechanism. If I order a stock over the
Internet-and I've heard stories where a person claims they never
made that order and they have no basis for arguing with their
provider.
Ms Hebbes:
Right, just like Visa. You can order a book from Amazon books,
you get the book and it's already been charged to your Visa card.
You get your book, you've got your statement, you call up Visa
and you say, "I didn't order this book. Take the $50 off my Visa
account," and they will do that.
Mr Waugh:
Eight per cent of delivered goods are actually resulting in
cardholder repudiation or cardholder-not-present types of
situations, and it's 22% for digitally delivered products. There
are businesses, there are retailers being hurt today by this lack
of support, a lack of a methodology that gives the legal and
audit backup to the transactions you're actually conducting.
So it's simple to use, with a low cost of
deployment. We have the opportunity to change the way in which
consumers are protected, both in terms of the transactions
they're deploying on the Internet as well as the information
itself. We've done that in collaboration with Mytec and using the
biometrics for the private key release, which is the fundamentals
of PKI. You have the public key, the private key. Has that been
explained to you?
The Chair:
No.
Mr Waugh:
This is the whole basis of this act, the public and private key.
The mathematics is really quite tremendous. It's very simple, but
basically if I encrypt with my private key it can be decrypted
using my public key, so that anyone decrypting that document that
I've signed using my private key has the assurance that it was
actually signed by me because I used my private key. It's 100%
assured when we attach that key or integrate it into the
biometrics for key release.
If I encrypt it under the
recipient's public key, then I know as the sender that only that
recipient can actually decrypt it, which was a fundamental
principle of the doctor prescribing medicine over the Internet
and the pharmacist receiving that. Only those two individuals
could see this information.
What I'd like to do now is
actually turn over to the demonstration. This is Rahim Alibhai.
Rahim works with E-Witness, CoolWater, was the principal
architect in the development of this technology. We do not intend
to lose him to the United States. We do intend to make this
company grow here in Canada. That was one of the principles of
the centres of excellence. So if we could just turn it over to
Rahim.
Ms Hebbes:
The PKI companies, by the way, are companies like Entrust, and
e-Scotia is very much involved in initiating PKI. So it would be
also instrumental to get their opinions on the act.
Mr Waugh:
Entrust has been working with the Canadian government and the
Ontario government for the last 16 years and now has 40% market
share of the PKI market and is one of the leaders in terms of the
delivery of digital signature technology.
This is a demonstration of
a doctor prescribing medicine over the Internet. As you can see,
there is a standard Web browser using a standard Web form.
Basically, the doctor would indicate who the patient is and this
will eventually be connected into the physician practice
management system, so it updates the doctor's patient file
automatically, actually increasing the accuracy of the patient
file and therefore probably the quality of health care. It's
simply a matter of choosing the drug for the patient and then,
rather than just hitting "submit," what we're doing is encrypting
that information that's in the form and then sending it. Part of
the encryption process is actually the signing of the document by
the doctor.
In this particular case,
we're going to authenticate ourselves here. We're a little
nervous-our fingerprints are moist-because of the importance of
the presentation.
Ms Hebbes:
CIBC has been using biometrics, just as a point, as far as
physical access into their buildings. You know how you have one
of those pass cards to get into the building. You can give that
pass card to anybody to get in but you still need your
fingerprint to authenticate that it's you who's actually going
in. So this biometrics as well, for your information, isn't
new.
1310
Mr Waugh:
This is leading-edge technology. It is part of the future.
If you'll bear with us
during this period, we're going to try to do it. There we go. I
scanned my fingerprint on the device. It took-
Mr Sergio:
I don't think he was using his whole thumb before.
Mr Waugh:
Maybe he used the wrong finger, which is nice about this
technology. Say you're at an ATM machine and you've got someone
with a gun to your head. With this technology I can switch
fingers, and that could be my SOS finger, and let this
transaction go through but send a 911 emergency call. There's a
lot of things that you can do with this.
So I scanned my finger. It
compared my finger to my biometric template which was imbedded in
this device. It decrypted the template, compared the two, the two
were equal and it released my private key to the process where
it's taken that data-and, as you can see, it's come from Dr Don,
but I don't know who the patient is. I can't see that, or the
patient's address or telephone number. I do know what was
prescribed by Dr Don but I don't know the dosage and I don't see
the rest of the comments regarding the prescription itself. I'm
going to go in as pharmacist Don since I was successful. Now,
this is on the receiving side. I've identified myself as the
pharmacist in this case.
This is actually coming off
of the server that's in our offices in Toronto. This is not being
retrieved locally.
Ms Hebbes:
It's not canned. It's happening live.
Mr Waugh:
The data, as you see, is still in its encrypted form. No one can
read that unless they have the right keys. I'm going to once
again authenticate. As a bona fide recipient, it's released my
private key, allowing the data to be decrypted. We are protecting
the patients' data and we can apply this to any consumer
information, protecting the consumer but at the same time
creating the legal environment that allows commerce to actually
take place, which does not exist today, and that's my biggest
concern from a business perspective. If JVC wants to receive a
$500,000 order from Future Shop, with this technology we have the
ability to make that legally binding for JVC.
Ms Hebbes:
Right. And it's not just the Bioscrypt that allows it to be
binding. Do you want to go through all that?
Mr Waugh:
We have another one, but I'd like to address our particular
concern about the legislation.
We've been working very
hard for the last year and a half to solve these issues and we
consider this legislation of prime importance to commerce in
Canada-in Ontario-in protecting the consumer, in protecting the
merchants, in
establishing the legal environment under which our future can
prosper. It's very important.
It's also catch-up
legislation to the US and Europe. This technology has been around
for 20 years-the RSA patent is actually being released; it's
coming out of patent protection on September 20-and it's been the
basis for many ways in which our armed forces and security
organizations have protected information in the past.
It is the basis for
electronic commerce and it's going to open up all sorts of
opportunities for streamlining Canadian business operations,
making us more productive and therefore increasing our standard
of living. But I'm concerned. I'm concerned that the Elections
Act has been kept out. With this technology we can allow shut-ins
to vote, to participate in government. We can increase the
frequency of their participation and we can make sure that you
know it's coming from a person who has the right to vote.
I'm concerned that cheques
are not allowed in here. You know, 1.8 billion ATM transactions
are going through that are not protected, but 1.4 billion cheques
are being processed every year here in Canada and they're being
excluded. The cheque is the source of fraud in Canada. Companies
are being hurt by employees who change the face of cheques and
have them deposited in their own accounts. This technology would
eliminate that.
Land transfers: With this,
lawyers can be enrolled; we know who they are. They can do a land
transfer on-line with this technology.
The message I would like to
deliver is: Do not exclude these documents. If you can, include
them. But if you can't include them specifically, include them
subject to regulatory approval.
Ms Hebbes:
And know that Mytec and E-Witness are only but a few companies
that are in the same industry that are sharing the same
technologies that make what you want to do possible, which is
privacy security, no infringement on personal privacy.
We're open to taking any
questions.
The Chair:
Thank you for a very comprehensive presentation. I think we will
allow one question, if you can try to keep it brief, please,
members of committee. We'll go to the government side first.
Mr
Wettlaufer: This doesn't really apply to the bill, but
how would your technology apply to smart cards?
Ms Hebbes:
I won't say where I was yesterday but it was pretty close to Bay
and Wellesley. It applies very much to smart cards. We're very
well aware of the Ontario smart card initiative that Angela Longo
and her team are putting together. Mytec, as a biometrics
company, can easily work in conjunction with a smart card. Let's
just say that this is my smart card, and you have your chip that
has your health insurance number, and maybe it has in the future
your driver's licence number. If you want to have a Bioscrypt
chip, a biometric chip on that smart card, it is easily applied
there. If you only want to get information about health records
from that smart card, technology will enable that to happen.
Mr
Wettlaufer: It will ensure complete patient
confidentiality?
Ms Hebbes:
Yes, 100%, and ensure that Janet Hebbes, with the correct
spelling and address, because of her fingerprints, is only
getting access to those services once.
Mr Sergio:
I have no particular questions, but thanks for coming down. It
was a good presentation. It's good to know that that is available
and on the market, and hopefully we can put it to good use some
time. Thank you.
Mr Martin:
It certainly was good to have an example of how this works so we
can get our heads around it. We're not techies, we're
politicians, and sometimes I have to confess to not having all
the knowledge or the answers to lots of really important
questions. So it was good that you showed this today.
I just wanted to tell you
that yesterday we had the bankers come before us to say that they
were very leery of this whole area of biometrics and they were
happy that we had centred it out in the document as something
that wasn't going to be included, because as far as they were
concerned the refining of that technology is years out and it's
not dependable and has not been developed to the point where it
actually could be used in the way that you've suggested here
today.
Ms Hebbes:
That's good. I haven't been in to all the banks yet, but you can
rest assured that I'm on a mission there and that the technology
is there for biometrics.
Mr Waugh:
I'd like to comment on that if I could. Changes to the Financial
Administration Act-I'm not certain where it actually occurs, but
you'll have noticed ATM machines are now white-labelled because
basically the door was opened to competition with the banks.
The bank is really two
things: a method for moving money and a place to park it. Banks
in making that statement are speaking in their own self-interest,
because the longer they hold those papers in place the longer
they control the flow of money in Canada. This technology has
matured where we can guarantee its movement and guarantee who
signed it and what was actually signed. They are acting in their
own self-interest to delay that legislation, and I'm very
concerned about that.
Mr Martin:
I can share with you their presentation to us and perhaps give
you the name of the gentleman who presented so that you might
have a discussion with him about that. It certainly would be
helpful.
The Chair:
Thank you very much, Ms Hebbes and Mr Waugh, and you too, Doctor.
We really appreciate your submission this afternoon.
That concludes the public
representations to committee. I will remind committee that
amendments are due by September 22 at 5 pm; clause-by-clause
consideration will be on October 2 at 3:30.
