Abstract
Statistics Canada has been offering Electronic Data Reporting (EDR) on a small scale as an option for survey respondents for several years. In the past year, the use of EDR has increased as more respondents and subject matter areas are requesting this data collection option. As a national statistical agency, Statistics Canada has strict policies related to confidentiality and privacy of respondent data. Technological and security-related issues have had to be addressed at each step along the way to providing EDR. This has had an impact on flexibility, user-friendliness and overall acceptance of the EDR tools provided thus far. Currently we are focusing on two main ways of receiving data electronically. The first is an infrastructure to receive survey data securely through encryption algorithms applied to the data on the respondents workstation. The second method of EDR allows the respondent to complete an interactive questionnaire over the Internet using Secure Sockets Layer connections and encryption at source. The paper will include a brief description of the tools, a discussion of issues encountered in deploying EDR options, factors we have found that affect the adoption of EDR by respondents and future directions.
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