Canada’s Privacy Commissioner is recommending that people buy legal marijuana with cash rather than plastic to help protect their personal information.
Daniel Therrien says marijuana sellers and buyers need to better understand their privacy rights and obligations, and has posted a set of guidelines on his website advising people how to protect their personal information when purchasing the recreational drug.
"Cannabis is illegal in most jurisdictions outside of Canada. The personal information of cannabis users is therefore very sensitive," said Therrien on his website. "Some countries may deny entry to individuals if they know they have purchased cannabis, even lawfully."
Some Canadians have been barred for life from entering the United States after admitting to using cannabis. Therrien suggests buyers can avoid the collection of their personal information by using cash instead of credit cards when purchasing marijuana from legal retail outlets.
However, the cash option is not available to many Canadians who have little choice but to buy online because some provinces have only a limited number of retail stores or, in the case of Ontario, no retail outlets at all for several more months.
And the online Ontario Cannabis Store has already reported a privacy breach that affected approximately 4,500 individuals in November. Information from about 2% of customer orders was accessed and stolen by a person using a Canada Post delivery tracking tool.
The Privacy Commissioner’s guidelines say that cannabis purchasers should guard their privacy by not providing retailers with more personal information than necessary, other than what is legally required to verify their age. And the guidelines also state that cannabis stores should only collect email addresses, and not customer names, for mailing lists or memberships.
