At Siwach Law, we know that confidentiality and privacy are of the utmost importance to you. As a matter of professional responsibility and as part of our commitment to providing excellent service, we are dedicated to protecting any personal information we hold and maintaining the trust you have placed in our firm.
This privacy policy outlines how we manage your personal information and safeguard your privacy.
“Personal information” has the same meaning as in the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and includes any information that identifies you or by which your identity could be deduced. Personal information does not include business contact information (your name, title, position, business address, telephone and fax number or business email address) and does not include “publicly available information” specified in the Act’s Regulations.
A. Governing Principles — Your Privacy Rights
Siwach Law collects, uses and discloses personal information in compliance with the requirements of the Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (the “Act”) and the provisions of the Canadian Standards Association’s Model Code for the Protection of Personal Information (the “Code”) incorporated into the Act.
B. What this Privacy Policy Covers
This Policy covers all personal information that is collected, used or disclosed by Siwach Law
C. What Personal Information does Siwach Law Collect?
Generally speaking, the types of personal information that Siwach Law may collect includes your name, home address, telephone number, personal email address, billing and account information, information about your legal issue and personal information about other individuals involved in your legal matter. The type and quantity of personal information that we collect in order to deliver legal services to you will vary depending on the nature of the services we are retained to provide.\n\nSiwach Law limits the collection of personal information to the amount and type of information that is required to fulfill the purposes for which it is collected. Collection of personal information is always made by fair and lawful means. We do not collect personal information indiscriminately, but limit such collection to the purposes identified in this Policy.
D. Identifying Purposes – How Personal Information is Used
Siwach Law collects, uses and discloses personal information for the following limited purposes:
(i) to provide legal advice and services to you
(ii) to assess applications submitted to us for employment opportunities with our firm
(iii) to administer our client (time and billing) databases
(iv) to establish and maintain client lists
(v) to help us avoid conflicts of interest
(vi) to establish and maintain mailing lists, which are used to communicate with you during the course of our retainer and to include you in any direct marketing activities conducted by our firm (such as the delivery of Legal Newsletters or invitations to seminars that we may be conducting). If you tell us that you do not wish to receive information about our services, we will not send you any further material.
To help us make credit decisions about clients, prevent fraud, check the identity of new clients and prevent money laundering, we may on occasion, request information about you from the files of consumer credit reporting agencies. Siwach Law does not use Social Insurance Numbers as a way of identifying or organizing the information we hold.
If you apply for a job at our firm and we do not offer a position to you, we do not retain the information provided with your application. If we offer you a job that you accept, the information you provided with your application will be retained in your employee file in accordance with our policies respecting employee information.
E. Disclosure of Personal Information
Siwach Law will disclose your personal information in the following circumstances:
(i) when we are required or authorized by law to do so (for example, if a court issues a subpoena or if the disclosure is required under the Rules of Civil Procedure)
(ii) when you have consented to the disclosure
(iii) when the disclosure is requested by a third party who, in our reasonable judgment, is seeking the information as your agent.
(iv) when the legal services we are providing to you requires us to give your information to third parties (for example, a lender in a real estate mortgage transaction). In such circumstances, your consent will be implied, unless you tell us otherwise
(v) if we engage a third party to provide administrative services to us (like computer back-up or archival file storage). In any such circumstance, we will ensure that the third party receiving your personal information is bound by the terms of this Privacy Policy
(vi) if we engage expert witnesses on your behalf
(vii) if we retain other law firms in other jurisdictions, on your behalf
If we use the services of any third party to process personal information, we will enter into legal agreement that require them to protect the personal information in a manner that is consistent with this Privacy Policy and acceptable to us.
F. Consent
We are committed to ensuring that you are aware of how your personal information is used. In most cases, we will ask you for your specific consent before we collect, use or disclose your personal information. Usually, this request for consent will be in writing, but in appropriate circumstances, we may accept your oral consent. Sometimes, your consent may be implied through your conduct with us.
G. Accountability
Our firm is responsible for the personal information we collect and which is under our control. To fulfill this responsibility, we have designated a Privacy Officer to be responsible for our Privacy Policy and personal information management procedures and have implemented appropriate security and training measures within our firm.
H. Openness
We make information about our personal information collection and management procedures available to all interested parties. If you have any questions about our collection, use and disclosure of your personal information or this Policy, please contact our Privacy Officer in writing as described in paragraph L of this Policy.
I. Access to your Personal Information
You are entitled to access your personal information. To make an access request, please contact our Privacy Officer in writing, as described in paragraph L of this Policy.
Summary information will be made available to you upon your request. More detailed requests which require archive or other retrieval costs may be subject to our normal professional and disbursement fees.
Please note that your right to access is not absolute and we may deny access:
(i) when denial of access is required or authorized by law (for example, when a record containing your personal information is subject to a claim of legal professional privilege by one of our clients)
(ii) when to do so would prejudice negotiations with you
(iii) to protect our firm’s rights and property
(iv) when the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings against you
(v) when granting access would have an unreasonable impact on other people’s privacy
(vi) where the request is frivolous or vexatious
If we refuse your request for access or refuse your request to correct information, we will explain why.
J. Safeguards to Protect your Personal Information
Siwach Law takes all reasonable precautions to ensure that your personal information is kept safe from loss, unauthorized access, modification or disclosure. Among the steps taken to protect your personal information are:
(i) Premises security
(ii) Restricted file access to personal information
(iii) Technological safeguards like security software and firewalls to prevent hacking or unauthorized computer access
(iv) Internal password and security policies
Employees who have access to personal information receive appropriate training to ensure compliance with our Privacy Policy.
Personal information that is no longer required is destroyed or rendered anonymous.
You should be aware that email is not a completely secure medium and no data transmitted over the internet can be guaranteed 100 percent secure. As a result, we do not assure the security of any information transmitted to us over the internet and you do so at your own risk.
Our website
You do not have to submit any information in order to visit our website. On our website, like most commercial websites, we may monitor traffic patterns, site usage and related site information in order to optimize our web service. We may provide aggregate information to third parties, but these statistics do not include any identifiable personal information. Please note that our website may contain links to other websites, which are not governed by this Privacy Policy.
K. Accuracy
Our firm is committed to maintaining accurate, complete and up-to-date personal information. If you are aware of any changes to the personal information you have provided to us, simply inform us of those changes and we will update our records.
You may review and correct your personal information by contacting the Privacy Officer referred to in paragraph L of this Policy.
L. Challenging Compliance
Siwach Law has designated an official who is responsible for managing our compliance with this Privacy Policy. This official will respond to your information requests regarding our privacy policies or about your personal information under our care and control.
Our Privacy Officer can be reached in writing at:
Privacy Officer
Siwach Law
Suite 528, 1000 Innovation Dr.
Kanata ON K2K 3E7
We investigate all complaints received by us and will respond in writing in a timely manner. If a complaint is found to be justified, we will take appropriate measures to resolve the matter to the satisfaction of the complainant.
In the event that you are not satisfied with the response you receive from our Privacy Officer, you may contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada at the following address:
Privacy Commissioner of Canada
112 Kent Street
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 1H3
www.privcom.gc.ca