i heard that the residential rental act in Alberta is more favor to landlord and they allow landlord to collect rental deposit and security deposit. and it's more fast process to get a bad tenant out of the rental property.
in Ontario, the law is more favor to the tenant. It takes time and money to get rid of a bad tenant, and landlord can not request security deposit to cover any potential damage to the house.
personally i think landlord requests rental/security deposit is very 合情. just try to stand on a different position to think, if you are the landlord and rent your house to someone that you never know before, what will you do to protect yourself?