CRTC makes it easier for telecom service provider groups to share customer information

Citing a need for more symmetrical and competitively neutral regulations, the CRTC will start allowing telecommunications service providers (TSPs) to share confidential customer information (CCI) with affiliate companies – a move that’s expected to make it easier for companies to offer service bundles to customers. But consumer advocates and one commissioner aren’t happy with the ruling. John Lawford, counsel at the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC), decries Telecom Decision 2009-773 for allowing telecom providers to share too much sensitive information about customers. This isn’t about allowing a telecom company to transfer tombstone information such as name and address from one affiliate to another, he says, it’s about giving the provider a wide range of information on telephone calling patterns and billing information that it can then use to upsell additional services. “I’m sure you’ll get people who will be happy to get offers that seem to fit their lifestyle, but others might not like that,” Lawford tells Network Letter in an interview. The Nov. 25 ruling changed the way the carriers with affiliate corporate structures are allowed to share CCI. Under the previous rules, companies with affiliates had to get express customer consent before they could share CCI within the larger organization while integrated TSPs didn’t have this requirement. The CRTC said the decision levels the playing field for service bundling opportunities between the two corporate structures. “The commission considers that this puts TSPs with affiliates at a competitive disadvantage in relation to integrated TSPs because the latter do not have to secure customer express consent to offer their bundled services,” reads the CRTC’s decision. However Lawford says the decision isn’t clear enough in determining what types of information can be shared between affiliate companies within the same corporate structure. He points to paragraph 18 of the decision to highlight his argument. “The commission determines that TSPs are permitted to disclose CCI to an affiliate involved in supplying the customer with telecommunications and/or broadcasting services, provided the information is required for that purpose and disclosure is made on a confidential basis with the information to be used only for that purpose,” reads the decision. Lawford questions “that purpose.” It’s not clearly defined and opens the door for telecom providers to share sensitive information such as billing information and credit worthiness, he says. Suzanne Lamarre, CRTC commissioner for Quebec, dissented on the decision, saying protecting the privacy and confidential nature of customer information outweighs the carriers’ needs to more easily market products and services to consumers. Requiring express consent from the customer to share information with affiliates, according to Lamarre “is a simple, transparent, and predictable remedy that allows the TSPs to do what they want to do. Of course it involves administrative inconvenience, but this is not, in my opinion, a competitive disadvantage brought about by regulation. The inconvenience rather stems from the TSP's corporate structure.” Lamarre argues that the commission’s role is to implement regulations in a symmetrical and competitively neutral manner to “greatest extent possible” and “not at any price.” And in this particular instance, the CRTC should have heeded those words, she writes. As was noted by Lawford, Lamarre says some consumers may not be too concerned about the new rules, but others will feel disclosing CCI under the new regime may be a breach of privacy. It is this subjective nature of how customers feel about their information that should have been reflected in the CRTC’s decision, she cautions. “In my opinion, it is not reasonable to deprive customers, who rightly believe that privacy protection is a fundamental right, of a say in the disclosure of their confidential information,” she writes.

CRTC makes it easier for telecom service provider groups to share customer information

News | December 3, 2009

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