With the explosive growth of the Internet and Canadians' expanding use of it, questions about privacy protection are increasingly taking centre stage in public debates. It is essential, though, to distinguish between the protection we might hope for from the organs of government and the regulations that apply to private companies with which we transact freely for products and services of our choosing. Even if protecting personal information is an issue in both cases, the dynamic is not the same. It is the latter subject that concerns us in this Economic Note.
