Information & Ethics committee  First of all, we need to protect, ASAP, the intellectual property of media and artists across Canada from the effects of AI right now. It will have a huge effect on intellectual property in Canada. Prohibit the use of deepfakes, ASAP. As far as social networks are concerned, we need to legislate to impose and compel total transparency of algorithms to better understand what's going on in terms of the flow of information and disinformation.

Information & Ethics committee  As I said earlier, it's very important to quickly adopt legislation to prohibit video and audio deep fakes, whether pornographic or otherwise. Canada needs better oversight of artificial intelligence, and of generative AI in particular, which uses chatbots. The social networks need to be totally transparent about their algorithms and the current absence of clarity has to end.

Information & Ethics committee  The European Union, which represents some 30 countries, is certainly very influential. We could indeed build on its approach, and also on France's statute prohibiting false news during election campaigns. We don't want to expand censorship in Canada, of course—quite the opposite—but we could draw inspiration from the French statute to try and combat disinformation, particularly during federal, provincial and municipal election campaigns.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, and transparency—total transparency—is key to fighting opacity.

Information & Ethics committee  They are able to in France. They have been doing so for years and have imposed major fines on Meta and Google for lack of respect for privacy or other issues—even the push for royalties for news media organizations across the EU. Yes, they have a leadership position in all of those fields.

Information & Ethics committee  We can, with pleasure, absolutely.

Information & Ethics committee  You won't find Facebook sending reporters to Moosejaw or Rimouski. The news media need to be protected. I'm pleased about the renewal of the Canada Media Fund and the importance being assigned to financial support for our media. We don't want them to disappear in the short, medium or long term.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, definitely. Action of that kind has to be considered bad corporate citizenship. It's unacceptable for news to be blocked in Canada. We are the only G-7 country without access to news that reports events like forest fires in the Northwest Territories. The U.S. elections will be held in early November, and the next general election in Canada will probably be next year.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, definitely. The media are often required to be transparent about the tools they use. Most of the media now have a charter under which they are required to indicate whether artificial intelligence software has been used. So the media are being transparent, but full transparency from the social networks about their algorithms should also be required.

Information & Ethics committee  I would recommend that you look at the leadership of the European Union and the strength of 28 or 29 countries that are heavily funding media literacy programs and programs against disinformation. Look at their website and all of the conferences they have held in the past few years.

Information & Ethics committee  I previously sent the notes to the committee, along with all my sources. I'd be happy to send them to your office.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, definitely. There are also tools, like CrowdTangle, that can identify whether information is viral or not, but Meta is unfortunately going to block access to them for researchers and colleagues. So it's possible with that kind of technology to identify something that could become viral very quickly.

Information & Ethics committee  One of the current dangers of TikTok is that it gets used as a search engine by 10 to 30-year-olds, when it's obvious that TikTok isn't a search engine. There are also clearly serious risks of sending data about Canadian users to the Chinese Communist Party government. The United States set a 270-day deadline before it will be blocking TikTok at the beginning of 2025, and Canada needs to consider doing so as well.

Information & Ethics committee  It's true that amplification by social networks, together with political polarization and a loss of confidence in the media are contributing to it. But I wouldn't go that far.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes indeed. That's why I'm arguing this morning for the establishment of a compulsory media and digital media education program in Canada's elementary and secondary schools. Digital education could also be provided to seniors. Did you know that when you publish something on social networks, it could end up on the front page of the National Post the next morning and be read by 10 million Canadians?