Canada is embarking on major nation-building projects, akin to critical infrastructure efforts. As we push forward towards this goal, we need to ensure that the footings to these projects are on solid foundations. While collaboration, consultation, and environmental concerns are well-discussed, we have a gap with respect to how we treat the data used or generated by these projects.
While certain aspects of this data may be well supported by privacy-related controls (such as the Specified Information for the Defence Industrial Base), another form of data needs to be examined. This data aligns less with private or proprietary data and more with the data that supports critical infrastructure. In those cases, confidentiality may play a secondary role behind the data’s availability and integrity. The challenge is not to maintain its confidentiality, but rather to ensure we have an immutable, resilient, and non-reputable source of data upon which to make policy decisions, other decisions, and upon which to base operations.
This introduces the concept of sovereign data or data that must be preserved in its trustworthy state and which remains under Canada’s sovereign control.
You can access the discussion paper on our resources page or at https://marseccoe.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Sovereign-Data-v1-1.pdf.