Industry committee  Likewise.

Industry committee  There have been a number of different proposals as to how it could be amended, so I—

Industry committee  I think the bill would benefit from some clarity around some of the terms used in paragraph 41.‍12(1)(a). Particularly "manufacturer" and "product" are terms that are somewhat alien to the Copyright Act. They could deserve some attention in terms of making them gel a bit better; however, it's important that amendments to the language don't essentially deprive the bill of its purpose and effect.

Industry committee  My answer would be that many jurisdictions are struggling with this issue. The jurisdictions that inherited the Digital Millennium Copyright Act treatment of TPMs as access controls are all struggling with what to do about this. There's no golden case for how it can be best approached.

Industry committee  I would just point out some of the obvious. We're currently experiencing a global shortage of microchips. There are bottlenecks in a whole host of industries, and the ability to achieve interoperability among different devices allows us to achieve new purposes and new functions for the equipment that we already have.

Industry committee  Currently, under proposed paragraph 41.‍12(1)(a), if you read the entirety of the bill, the assumption is that if you are not a manufacturer of a product or device and you're someone else—for example, a researcher or someone in the process of gathering information towards the development of a product, but you're not yet manufacturing it—you would need to own a copy of the computer program or have a licence to use it.

Industry committee  Of course federal-provincial co-operation is needed for this type of policy, because we're often dealing with products that are the subject of contract warranties. Consumer protection, though, to answer your question, can mean a few different things. With capital “c” and “p”, consumer protection law in terms of the statutes provincially will require provincial co-operation.

Industry committee  As I mentioned, consumer protection acts in the provinces, and other provincial legislation that deals with the sale of goods and contracts for goods and services, could be an issue when there is a contractual restriction on interoperability, as between the manufacturer and the consumer.

Industry committee  My answer to that is fairly straightforward: None should be exempt. There's no policy reason for the Copyright Act to be industry-specific for certain types of exceptions or limitations. There's no real justification for why that should be the case. Industry groups may come to you and say, “It's already been solved by an independent agreement” or “It shouldn't apply to our industry, because it will produce certain disadvantages in competition.”

Industry committee  I'm assuming the question was directed at me.

Industry committee  Those considerations are certainly valid, particularly when we're dealing with sensitive information or data that could be personalized. Again, however, I think we need to remember the role of copyright law. There's legislation for public and consumer safety outside of the Copyright Act.

Industry committee  In some ways, what we're talking about here is a little bit of comparing apples to oranges. In the one case, it's circumventing the TPM in a physical device for the purpose of making it interoperable with another device or computer program. In some ways, that's quite distinct from circumventing a TPM that protects an algorithmic process to understand how it works for other purposes.

Industry committee  I'm happy to take the first crack at that question. In some ways, your question echoes a bit the submissions from IPIC on that point. My position is that this bill is, in many ways, consistent with Canada's obligations under CUSMA. In particular, we can look to paragraph 20.66(4)(h) of CUSMA, which is the relevant section for TPMs.

Industry committee  Sure. I think there's a bit to unpack with the question. First of all, there is interoperability permitted under the act. There's already an exception for that. The problem is that the exception that exists defines interoperability very narrowly as this process between two computer programs.

Industry committee  Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and honourable members of the committee. It is my pleasure to once again appear to share my perspective on copyright, software TPMs and anti-circumvention policy. This time it is in relation to the proposed Bill C-294 and interoperability. I am a doctoral researcher in law at the European University Institute and a graduate of the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.