Universities move to hide work from U.S. eyes CAROLINE ALPHONSO >From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Concerned about the U.S. government's prying eyes, a number of Canadian universities are changing the way their professors and students conduct online research. Many university libraries subscribe to RefWorks, a popular U.S.-based Internet tool that allows academics and students to create personal accounts and store research information, as well as generate citations and bibliographies. But the Patriot Act which grew out of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and which potentially allows U.S. authorities to sweep through databases such as RefWorks has prompted Canadian postsecondary institutions to abandon the American server for one housed at the University of Toronto. There is certainly concern within Canadian university libraries. It's a concern about a foreign country having access to your personal information without good cause, said William Maes, librarian at Dalhousie University in Halifax. That's the devious thing of the Patriot Act, they can do this without letting anybody know. With RefWorks, professors and students set up personal accounts on the U.S. database and can then save journal titles for their research records. Amid heightened fears about terrorist activities, Canadian university officials worry that if the research is of a sensitive nature, it could be misunderstood. For example, an academic researching North Korea or nuclear weapons could find the work flagged by the Bush government, university librarians fear. As a result, Dalhousie, Memorial University of Newfoundland and the University of Alberta are among the institutions that have switched to the Canadian server. The hope is that data on a Canadian server will be protected from the Patriot Act, which gives authorities virtually unlimited investigative powers. Mr. Maes said it is still possible for the RCMP and CSIS to probe the Ontario server, but in Canada there is at least judicial oversight. Mr. Maes said the Halifax-based university has been using RefWorks for two years now, but strengthened privacy legislation in Nova Scotia coupled with the Patriot Act drove Dalhousie, as well as other Atlantic institutions, to move to the Ontario server this academic year. Universities still have access to RefWorks, but now the personal information of professors and students is stored in Ontario. The U of T server, managed on behalf of the Ontario Council of University Libraries, was created four years ago to give the province's institutions more control over how research information is managed. Universities pay RefWorks for the site licences, and then pay a small fee to U of T to offset the costs of using the server. It made more sense that if it's Canadian academic work, it should be housed on a Canadian academic server, said John Teskey, director of libraries at the University of New Brunswick. Karen Adams, library director at the University of Alberta, said her institution switched over to the Ontario server this past month after using RefWorks for several years. The reason: We have strong privacy legislation here in Alberta, and the U.S. Patriot Act was just another angle that caused us to realize the importance of it all [protecting users]. RefWorks president Colleen Stempien said that while she understands the concerns of some Canadian universities, the company goes to great lengths to protect the data of its customers. Ms. Stempien said the company's lawyers are looking at what powers the U.S. government has under the Patriot Act. She said RefWorks didn't have a problem when Canadian universities requested to switch servers. If our customers are concerned about it, we want our customers to be comfortable, she said. Since there was an opportunity to host it somewhere where they felt more comfortable there was no reason to say no. Indeed, some researchers at Memorial refused to sign on to RefWorks until the switch took place, said Karen Lippold, head of the university's information-services division. The university signed on to RefWorks over the summer, and moved to the Canadian server last month. There are about 300 faculty and students at Memorial using the service. We had some people who didn't seem to think it was an issue. We had some people who felt it was an issue and were holding off and weren't going to establish an account until it moved, Ms. Lippold said. We're pleased that it is now in Canada. While some universities have already made the switchover fearing the scope of the Patriot Act, others outside Ontario are still considering the move. Michelle Lamberson, director of the office of learning technology at the University of British Columbia, said that users at the institution receive a warning that their information is being stored in the United States when they log into RefWorks. UBC is looking at switching over to the Ontario-based server to make sure private information is kept safe, she said.
