Social Media Terms of Use

The Office of the Public Sector Integrity Commissioner (PSIC) uses social media platforms (Twitter and YouTube) to communicate with Canadians on the subject of disclosure protection regimes in the federal public sector.

Content

PSIC posts will include (but are not limited to):

  • Links to media releases, case reports tabled in Parliament, key decisions of public interest, research reports, as well as other approved and publicly available PSIC material;
  • Links to relevant information produced and published elsewhere (work of other commissioners, advocacy organizations, researchers, news organizations, etc.), including videos posted on YouTube and retweets from other Twitter users;
    (See below for our policy on retweets.)
  • Interesting facts, quotes, videos or observations related to the disclosure protection regime.

Note: PSIC can discuss general topics of interest, but not the details of a specific case unless it has been founded and tabled before Parliament.

Following/Subscribing

PSIC's decision to follow a particular Twitter user or YouTube channel does not imply endorsement of any kind. We follow users and channels that we believe are relevant to the mandate of our work and to the work of other government agencies and departments.

Followers/Subscribers

We will remove or block followers and subscribers when they post material that is not appropriate, including any of the following:

  • serious, not proven, not supported, or not accurate accusations against individuals or organizations;
  • abusive, aggressive, coarse, vulgar, violent, obscene or pornographic comments;
  • racist, hateful, sexist, homophobic, slanderous, insulting or life-threatening messages;
  • messages that encourage or suggest illegal activity;
  • messages that infringe copyright or other intellectual property rights;
  • messages written in a language other than English or French;
  • comments not sent by the author and/or posted by anonymous or robot accounts;
  • unintelligible or irrelevant messages; and
  • messages that infringe upon an individual's privacy.

Replies, Comments and Direct Messages

We cannot commit to replying to every message. We will, however, attempt to engage in conversations when possible.

The Office of the Public Sector Integrity Commissioner does not receive disclosures via email or social media. To make a disclosure of wrongdoing, please use the traditional channels.

Official Languages

We respect the Official Languages Act and the related Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat policies. We are committed to providing information and services in English and French. However, users should be aware that some information from external sources that are not subject to the Official Languages Act is provided as a convenience and is available only in the language in which it was provided. Information and services that are provided on this site in language(s) other than English or French are provided as a convenience for users.

Privacy

Our Twitter account and YouTube channel are outside of the control of the Government of Canada. We encourage you to read the privacy policies and guidelines of Twitter and YouTube. We also caution you to be very careful about what you post. Avoid posting anything personal about yourself or anyone else.

We respect personal information as required by Canada's Privacy Act. Also, we ask followers to respect the personal privacy of others. However, we cannot guarantee that all users will comply, and we cannot be held accountable for personal information posted by participants. We will remove or block followers who post the personal information of others.

You participate at your own risk, taking personal responsibility for your posts, your username, and any information provided. To protect your privacy and the privacy of others, please do not include things such as telephone numbers, email addresses, or other personal identifiers.

Links to Other Websites

Links to websites not under the control of the Government of Canada are provided only for the convenience of users. We are not responsible for the accuracy, currency, or reliability of the content of other sites. We do not offer any guarantee in that regard. We are not responsible for the information found through these links, nor do we endorse the sites or their content.

Availability

We accept no responsibility for lack of service due to Twitter or YouTube downtime.

Retweets on Twitter

Tweets that we retweet do not imply endorsement on our part. We may retweet news and links that we believe are relevant to the work we do in the investigation of disclosures of wrongdoing in the federal public sector and reprisal protection. Tweets are composed and delivered in both official languages. However, if a tweet is meant to highlight a link to content found elsewhere on the Web, the tweet will be sent in the official language of the content it links to. Similarly, a retweet will only be delivered in the language of the original author (English or French only).

PSIC Staff Using Twitter

Some PSIC employees tweet outside of work hours and in their personal capacity under their own names or pseudonyms. Despite their professional affiliation with PSIC, the tweets of employees in their personal capacity do not represent the official position of PSIC. Such tweets should be considered as those of private citizens.

If you have questions about these terms of use, please contact us.