Tawana Charles

Con­cerns about da­ta breach­es, un­law­ful ac­cess to per­son­al in­for­ma­tion and on­line pri­va­cy are all per­ti­nent is­sues in the dig­i­tal era when it comes to is­sues of the right to pri­va­cy and breach of con­fi­dence.

Mat­ters such as per­son­al se­crets, med­ical records, fi­nan­cial in­for­ma­tion and trade se­crets are all things which peo­ple would wish to keep them­selves. This ar­ti­cle takes a look at the le­gal frame­work in Trinidad and To­ba­go that pro­tects in­di­vid­u­als from un­war­rant­ed in­tru­sion in­to their per­son­al lives, al­low­ing them to keep such as­pects con­fi­den­tial, shield­ing it from pub­lic scruti­ny.

Pri­va­cy Laws

The Con­sti­tu­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go pro­vides the fol­low­ing pro­tec­tions for all per­sons against ac­tions of the State:

The Right to Lib­er­ty – Sec­tion 4(a) which pro­tects the right to per­son­al lib­er­ty and se­cu­ri­ty of the per­son. It in­cludes safe­guards against un­rea­son­able search­es and seizures in one’s home, ar­bi­trary de­ten­tion and em­pha­sis­es the im­por­tance of pro­tect­ing the dig­ni­ty and free­dom of in­di­vid­u­als.

The Right to En­joy­men t of Per­son­al Prop­er­ty – Sec­tion 4(a) re­in­forces the pro­tec­tion of pri­va­cy in one’s home and oth­er prop­er­ty.

The Right of the in­di­vid­ual to re­spect for his pri­vate and fam­i­ly life – Sec­tion 4(c) which in­cludes al­low­ing in­di­vid­u­als the abil­i­ty to make choic­es about their own lives, bod­ies, and per­son­al mat­ters and main­tain fam­i­ly life with­out un­due in­ter­fer­ence from oth­ers or the gov­ern­ment.

The Right to Free­dom of Thought and Ex­pres­sion – Sec­tion 5(i) which ac­knowl­edges the im­por­tance of in­di­vid­ual au­ton­o­my in mat­ters of per­son­al be­lief and ex­pres­sion.

In ad­di­tion to the Con­sti­tu­tion, the Da­ta Pro­tec­tion Act Chap. 22:04 specif­i­cal­ly pro­tects the per­son­al da­ta of cit­i­zens, in both the pri­vate and pub­lic sec­tors. The act sets out the reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work that da­ta con­trollers with­in the coun­try must abide by when en­gag­ing in da­ta pro­cess­ing ac­tiv­i­ties.

Law of Con­fi­dence

Linked to the right to pri­va­cy, the courts have pro­nounced on the right to pro­tec­tion of unau­tho­rised dis­clo­sure of con­fi­den­tial in­for­ma­tion. When some­one is en­trust­ed with con­fi­den­tial in­for­ma­tion, there is an ex­pec­ta­tion that they will not dis­close or mis­use that in­for­ma­tion with­out prop­er con­sent, ei­ther be­cause of an im­plied or ex­pressed con­tract, a fidu­cia­ry re­la­tion­ship, a pro­fes­sion­al du­ty, or a gen­er­al eq­ui­table prin­ci­ple. Dis­clo­sure of this in­for­ma­tion may cause harm or detri­ment to the oth­er par­ty.

For a claim of breach of con­fi­dence to suc­ceed:

1. The in­for­ma­tion must have the nec­es­sary qual­i­ty of con­fi­dence.

2. There must have been an oblig­a­tion to main­tain con­fi­dence.

3. There must have been an unau­tho­rised breach of the oblig­a­tion caus­ing detri­ment to the con­fider.

(See the lo­cal case of Therese Ho v Lendl Sim­mons CV 2014-01949, de­liv­ered 26 Oc­to­ber 2015). Reme­dies in­clude in­junc­tions to pre­vent fur­ther dis­clo­sure and mon­e­tary com­pen­sa­tion.

Tawana Charles is a stu­dent at the Hugh Wood­ing Law School.

This col­umn is a pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion ini­tia­tive of the Coun­cil of Ed­u­ca­tion - Hugh Wood­ing Law School, Le­gal Aid Clin­ic in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Guardian Me­dia. It does not con­sti­tute le­gal ad­vice on any spe­cif­ic le­gal mat­ter. If you have a le­gal is­sue, you should con­sult an at­tor­ney-at-law. Co­or­di­na­tor: Roshan Ram­char­i­tar