Privacy Commissioner case notes: A resource from NZ and beyond

1. Privacy Issues Forum 2006 Wellington, 30 March 2006 Privacy Commissioner case notes: A resource from NZ and beyond Blair Stewart Assistant Commissioner Office of the Privacy Commissioner New Zealand

2. What’s a case note? “Any report outlining the outcome of an investigation, conciliation or determination of a complaint that is contained in a series of reports released by a privacy authority” Source: Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities Forum, Statement of Common Administrative Practice on Case Note Citation, adopted 17 November 2005

3. What’s in a case note? • A label identifying the report within a series i.e. a citation allowing people to find the note and know where it’s from etc., may also say something about the case itself • Some facts • Some instructive indication of the outcome of the case e.g. on how investigated, mediated, resolved or law interpreted

4. What’s a case note? “Any report outlining the outcome of an investigation, conciliation or determination of a complaint that is contained in a series of reports released by a privacy authority” Source: Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities Forum, Statement of Common Administrative Practice on Case Note Citation, adopted 17 November 2005

5. Case notes can go where judgments cannot … Complaints closed - 2019 No jurisdiction - 56 Typical 2 years complaints load * Closed within jurisdiction - 2003 Settled: no provisional opinion - 1490 Provisional opinion - 473 Settled: no final opinion - 94 Final opinion - 379 Total closed without final opinion - 1584 HRRT - 31 * Figures are for 2001/02 and 2004/05 combined

6. Case notes can go where judgments cannot … Complaints closed – 100% No jurisdiction – 2% Closed within jurisdiction – 98% Settled: no provisional opinion – 74% Provisional opinion – 23% Settled: no final opinion – 5% Final opinion – 19% Total closed without final opinion – 78% HRRT – 2% Approximations only

7. Case notes in NZ • Office of the Privacy Commissioner issuing case notes since 1996 • Now about 125 i.e. about 10-12 p.a. Since then other Privacy Commissioners have also started case noting …

8. The steady advance of case notes in Asia Pacific region …

9. APPA (formerly PANZA+) has adopted a citation standard Abbreviations adopted for APPA participants: • HKPrivCmr – Hong Kong Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data • KRPIDMC – Korean Personal Information Dispute Mediation Committee • NSWPrivCmr - New South Wales Privacy Commissioner • NTICmr – Northern Territory Information Commissioner • NZPrivCmr - New Zealand Privacy Commissioner • PrivCmrA – Privacy Commissioner of Australia • VPrivCmr – Victorian Privacy Commissioner Source: Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities Forum, Statement of Common Administrative Practice on Case Note Citation, 17 November 2005

10. Case notes to date from APPA members

11. Canada has been active too

12. NZ case notes as a slice of the pie

13. Why stop at NZ case notes? • If you find case notes useful – for advice, interpretation or educative purposes – you may not want to stop just at the local ones • Based on near universal principles

14. How to obtain case notes? • NZ OPC mailing lists, compilations • Individual web sites • Increasingly RSS/email alerts • Professional texts (e.g. PLAP) • Or • Central depository with a common search engine - a very powerful option • www.worldlii.org

15. www.worldlii.org/int/special/privacy/ Various searches by: • groups of databases • named databases etc. Can branch out with all WorldLII if wanting general court decisions Boolean searches Watch out for FOI cases (e.g. NOT FOI)

16. Remember • Lots of case notes now available • Readily accessible, able to be cited

17. Handouts • Overseas case notes • Some new NZ ones • Survey of users– please complete and drop off The end