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Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: can.general
Subject: Re: Borrowed records from Revenue Canada
Message-ID: <7329@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 19-Nov-86 13:32:19 EST
Article-I.D.: utzoo.7329
Posted: Wed Nov 19 13:32:19 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 19-Nov-86 13:32:19 EST
References: <623@water.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 23

> Have you noticed how many forms you have to fill that contain
> the S.I.N., even though there are only 3 or 4 official use for
> it : your employee record, your income taxe form and ...?
> With such a Universal number, invasion of privacy by computer
> matching is a definite possibility...

It's surprising how many of those forms will be quietly accepted, with
no hassles, if you just "forget" to fill in the SIN.  I've been doing this
for years, and have never been challenged on it.  (Plan B, should I ever
be challenged on this, is "I don't have it with me".)

> ... an obvious example is when I subscribe to a magazine and
> get put on dozen of mailing lists without my autorisation. 

Most magazines will refrain from doing this if you so request.  The default
is "do it" rather than "don't do it" because (a) most people don't care (me,
I love throwing out junk mail -- it costs them money to print and mail,
and costs me nothing to discard) and (b) selling mailing lists gets them a
great deal of revenue, which is an attractive alternative to raising the
price of the magazine.
-- 
				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry