International Law

Privacy commissioner raps home improvement retailer for collecting drivers licenses on product returns

By David T.S. Fraser

The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta has ruled that Home Depot violated the Personal Information Protection Act (Alberta) when it collected and recorded a customer drivers license information in connection with a product return. The company's policy was that returns for purchases that were made with a debit card, even with a receipt, are treated as a "no receipt" return and the information is collected. The Commissioner noted that the information would be placed in a database maintained by the American parent company in the United States, which is a disclosure of personal information.

The article on Canada.com quotes a Home Depot spokesperson who says this is no longer the policy as customers thought it to be an invasion of privacy. See: Privacy commissioner raps Home Depot.

Full post as published by The Canadian Privacy Law Blog on April 01, 2008 (boomark / email).