It turns out that Canadians don’t know much about the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), which came into effect on Jan. 1.

According to the latest Strategy/ Decima poll, more than 81% of Canadians aren’t aware of the law, which is designed to protect personal information that is collected, used or disclosed by marketers.

The responses differed by region, as well as by age and income level. For instance, those in Quebec were least likely to be familiar with PIPEDA (13.5%), while those in Ontario were on the opposite end of the scale, with 20% responding that they recognized the law. Awareness also increased with household income and age. Peggy Richardson-McKee, SVP at Toronto-based Decima Research thinks this is probably due to the fact that older consumers read more newspapers and have therefore seen more media coverage about PIPEDA.

Despite the lack of knowledge, a second question – phrased ‘If asked, would you give Canadian companies the opportunity to contact you for marketing purposes?’ – suggests that the majority of consumers are indeed concerned about privacy.

Only 34% answered yes to the question, compared to 60% who said no. ‘I’m not surprised that only 34% said yes because people in general are nervous about their private information,’ says Richardson-McKee.

Again, generational and regional differences were noted. The wealthy baby boomer demographic appears to be most open to future contact, with 39% answering yes, while only 28% of the 55+ age group did the same.

Regionally, Atlantic Canadians appear to be most willing to hear from marketers with 43.5% responding affirmatively, compared to only 31.4% of Albertans and 32% of British Columbians.

Ed Cartwright, a spokesperson for the Canadian Marketing Association, believes that although the second question was probably too broad, the results are still rather positive. ‘When you see that upwards of one-third of Canadians, without any prodding, say they would give Canadian companies the opportunity to contact them for marketing purposes, that’s actually gratifying.’

Decima conducted this poll on behalf of Strategy via its monthly telephone omnibus, for which data was collected from 2,000 consumers between Dec. 4 and 14. Each month a random sample is generated and quotas for each region are disproportionately allocated. The data is weighted in tabulation to replicate actual population distribution by age and sex within regions, according to census data.

For more information, contact Decima Research at (416) 962-2013.