Wastewater monitoring for public health surveillance is a rapidly growing field. Despite being used for decades, no policy at the federal, provincial, or municipal level specifically addresses the collection of wastewater data. More recently, scientists have found cryptic viral lineages in wastewater which are specific to their hosts and can be used to identify the individuals carrying them. However, unlike collecting wastewater samples from public infrastructure, the identification of an individual carrying a cryptic viral lineage is invasive and infringes upon their right to privacy. A balance must be struck between protecting the privacy of individuals and protecting the health of all Canadians [4]. It is imperative to establish ethical reviews for wastewater surveillance and data collection to ensure these public health surveillance projects can be used for the maximum benefit to the health of Canadians while still respecting the fundamental freedom of privacy. While currently individuals can only be indirectly identified using wastewater data, as this technology improves it may become possible for Canadians to be directly identified. To guide how this information should be handled, ethical reviews prior to the beginning of a wastewater surveillance project need to be conducted, as well as annual delegated reviews to ensure the privacy of Canadians is minimally affected and that communities being surveilled are involved with the collection of cryptic lineage data.