Like other financial sectors around the world, financial companies and organizations in Canada are strictly monitored by the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC) for strict compliance with their text archiving and call recording standards.
Operating under Recognition Orders from the provincial and territorial securities commissions that comprise the Canadian Securities Administrators, it has quasi-judicial powers to set and enforce laws in the Canadian securities and trading markets – and can levy fines, suspensions, and other disciplinary actions against non-compliant firms, brokers, agents, and financial advisors.
Read on as we detail in this post the IIROC’s text message archiving and voice call recording requirements, and how an enterprise archiving solution can help Canadian financial organizations meet their compliance requirements.
Financial Organizations and Individuals That Must Comply
Under its Record Retention Requirements for Members, the IIROC mandates those member firms which have been incorporated under the Canada Business Corporations Act or under certain provincial corporations acts, as well as dealers, to maintain client files including client correspondence such as text messages and phone calls.
Text Messages and Call Recordings That Must Be Captured and Recorded
Pursuant to National Instrument 31-103, Registration Requirements, Exemptions and Ongoing Registrant Obligations (“NI 31-103”), IIROC member firms must retain records of their business activities, financial affairs, client transactions and communication. Electronic communication may constitute advertising, for instance, promotional text messages, as well as sales literature, or client correspondence.
In order to retain these types of communications, dealer members must design or invest in systems and programs that will allow them to capture and record text messages and phone calls compliantly, and that have retrieval functionalities which would allow them to retrieve all relevant text messages and phone calls in case of examination.
Period of Retention
All text messages, voice calls and related documents must be retained for a period of 5 years from the date of creation.
Records Management, Delivery, and Consent Standards
There are several rules and standards with which companies must comply to ensure that all archived text messages and voice calls are kept and managed safely, securely, and efficiently:
- The Rule 2400 requires Dealer members sharing the same office premises with another financial services entity to keep client records separate from the records of that financial services entity. Electronic records such as archived text messages and phone calls must have separate passwords or other similar controls to ensure they are not accessible by the financial services entity. Separate computer hardware and software is also recommended.
- The Member Regulation Notice MR008 requires Member firms that intend to deliver information to their clients via electronic means to take reasonable precautions to ensure the integrity, confidentiality, and security of that information. Members transmitting personal financial information electronically must tailor those precautions to the medium used in order to ensure that the information is reasonably secure from tampering or alteration.
- Rule 29.7 requires firms to warn their clients about the risks of using electronic channels such as voice calling or text messaging when they consent to using such channels to communicate order instructions.
With TeleMessage, financial companies and institutions in Canada can effectively comply with IIROC text message archiving and call recording compliance requirements. Message Mobile Archiver is an enterprise messaging app effectively addressing compliance, regulatory, and eDiscovery response requirements and which reduces risk across the Canadian financial sector.
TeleMessage captures and records mobile content, including SMS, MMS, Calls, and Chats from corporate or BYOD mobile phones. Messages are securely and reliably retained within TeleMessage servers or forwarded to an archiving data storage vendor of your choice.
Our mobile archiving products securely record content from mobile carriers and mobile devices for a variety of ownership models (BYOD, CYOD, and employer-issued). With our multiple archiving solutions, you can always find the right tools or blend for your requirements:
TeleMessage offers cross-carrier and international mobile text & calls archiving for corporate and BYOD phones. Contact us today to try our mobile archiving products.
