Jennifer Stoddart (born 1949) was the sixth

Privacy Commissioner of Canada The privacy commissioner of Canada () is a non-partisan ombudsman and officer of the Parliament of Canada. The commissioner investigates complaints regarding violations of the federal ''Privacy Act'', which deals with personal information hel ...

Early life and education

Stoddart was born in 1949 in

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

. In 1967 she graduated from

Neuchâtel Junior College Neuchâtel Junior College (or NJC) is a private international school located in the French-speaking town of Neuchâtel, Switzerland. It is a member of Canadian Accredited Independent Schools. History NJC was founded in 1956 by Leonard Wilde, an E ...

in Switzerland. Fluent in five languages, she studied Quebec social history and received a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA or AM) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Those admitted to the degree have ...

in history from the

Université du Québec à Montréal The (UQAM; ), is a French language, French-language public university, public research university based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest constituent element of the system. UQAM was founded on April 9, 1969, by the government o ...

. In 1980 she received a licence in civil law from

McGill University McGill University (French: Université McGill) is an English-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill University, Vol. I. For the Advancement of Learning, ...

; she was admitted to the bar in 1981. She is married to an architect who teaches urban planning; they have two grown sons.

Career

As a lawyer she worked to modernize regulations and remove barriers to employment based on gender or cultural differences. She headed the Quebec Commission on Access to Information and held senior positions at the Quebec Human Rights and Youth Rights Commission, the Canadian Human Rights Commission and the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women. On December 1, 2003, Stoddart was appointed Canada's Privacy Commissioner by the Governor in Council for a seven-year term. In December 2010, she was reappointed for a three-year term, which ended in December 2013. In her role as commissioner she gave an annual report to Parliament about privacy trends and results of investigations, including privacy audits of government departments. Her 2013 report drew attention to privacy problems with the

Canada Revenue Agency The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA; ; ) is the revenue service of the Government of Canada, Canadian federal government, and most Provinces and territories of Canada, provincial and territorial governments. The CRA collects Taxation in Canada, taxes, ...

. She represented Canada at the annual International Conference on Privacy and Personal Data Protection. In November 2005, a journalist showed Stoddart her own telecommunication-data for the past few months - the ones from her private connection as well as those from the blackberry-systems provided by the government - which he had bought by an online data broker for about $200. In 2008, she drew international headlines when she announced an investigation into the privacy policies of

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

, which resulted in the social media site instituting privacy protections for its users. Stoddart has been active in the

Canadian Bar Association The Canadian Bar Association (CBA), or Association du barreau canadien (ABC) in French, represents over 37,000 lawyers, judges, notaries, law teachers, and law students from across Canada. History The Association's first Annual Meeting was ...

and the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice. She also serves as one of the board members on the

social purpose corporation A social purpose corporation (SPC) is a type of for-profit entity, a corporation, in some U.S. states that enables, but does not require, considering social or environmental issues in decision making. SPCs are similar to benefit corporations (B c ...

Purism Purism, referring to the arts, was a movement that took place between 1918 and 1925 that influenced French painting and architecture. Purism was led by Amédée Ozenfant and Charles Edouard Jeanneret (Le Corbusier). Ozenfant and Le Corbusier f ...

, which makes security-focused, Debian GNU/Linux based laptops & tablets.

Honours

Jennifer Stoddart received a Doctor of Laws, ''honoris causa'' (LLD), at McGill University’s fall convocation ceremonies on Tuesday, November 10, 2015. She was made a Knight of the

National Order of Quebec The National Order of Quebec ( French: ), also known as the Order of Quebec, is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of Quebec. Instituted in 1984 when Lieutenant Governor Jean-Pierre Côté granted royal assent to the (Natio ...

in 2020.

References

External links

Biography of Jennifer Stoddart
* http://www.privacyconference2005.org/ {{DEFAULTSORT:Stoddart, Jennifer Privacy Commissioners of Canada Lawyers in Quebec Université du Québec à Montréal alumni Living people Place of birth missing (living people) Canadian women lawyers 1949 births 21st-century Canadian civil servants McGill University Faculty of Law alumni 21st-century Canadian women civil servants

Early life and education

Career

Honours

See also

References

External links