Public Safety Committee on May 27th, 2024

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I just want to say that we all managed to do this together. I think it is a very important signal that, when we have a commitment to do something together and have common purpose, we can actually get stuff done. I want to thank my former colleagues from this committee, whom I miss dearly, for allowing us to do this and for all working together.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

We're all going to the Canadian heritage committee now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Actually, this process is not particularly unusual for this place at this time of year, nor is the sudden rapprochement towards the end.

To our witnesses, thank you for waiting. We'll continue with your remarks now, followed by questions. You were slated for a full hour. We have resources to give you that full hour. Mr. Dufresne is out there with Ms. Lara Ives. I've advised them that, when we start, we will bring them in an hour later, so we will have that full panel, as well.

That being the case, I would like to now welcome the witness who is the sponsor of Bill S-210 in the Senate. I should note that Senator Miville-Dechêne has been shepherding this bill through the various processes since 2020. I think she's launched it four times.

Anyway, we're glad to at last have you able to speak.

We have the Honourable Julie Miville-Dechêne, senator. We also have, as an individual, Jérôme Lussier, director of parliamentary affairs for the office of Senator Miville-Dechêne.

I now invite the senator to make an opening statement of up to five minutes.

Please go ahead.

[Julie Miville-Dechêne, Senator, Quebec, ISG]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for the invitation to talk about Bill S-210. I'd be happy to answer questions in French, but I'm going to give my speech in English, because that's the language in which most of the criticism has been voiced.

To answer your question directly, let me say the following: This bill has been the subject of two studies at committee, because of the election. We have heard from 24 witnesses and there were 28 briefs. So we can say that this bill has been thoroughly studied at the Senate.

Bill S-210 seeks to apply to online porn the rules that normally apply off-line. The bill does three things. First, it requires websites that offer porn to verify the age of users before they can access that content. Second, it sets up an enforcement mechanism that can result in non-complying websites getting blocked in Canada. Third, it provides that acceptable age verification methods will be decided in regulation, to be adopted after consultation and with input from experts. The bill specifies that any approved method must be reliable, collect information solely for age verification purposes, destroy any personal information once the verification is done and comply with best practices.

Polls indicate that close to 80% of Canadians support age verification to access porn online, but Bill S-210 has been attacked, and I want to correct some misrepresentations.

It has been said that no country has done this. This is false. Germany, France, the U.K., the European Union and several U.S. states have passed laws and regulation to impose age verification to access porn. Spain is expected to launch a pilot project soon. Australia, which had paused this work, announced last week that it would move ahead.

It has been painted as a partisan or ideological bill to control sexuality. False. Age verification is supported by the socialist government of Spain and the conservative government in the U.K. In California, an age verification bill was recently approved unanimously by two legislative committees. This is not partisan legislation.

It has been called an attack on free expression. False again. Bill S-210 would not affect the availability of porn for adults; it would simply prevent children from accessing it. In Europe, porn sites have challenged age verification laws and have failed at every stage. In the U.S.—a country known for its robust speech protection—porn sites have challenged the laws and they have failed all the way to the Supreme Court.

It has been said that age verification would mean submitting personal identification to porn sites. False again. In Europe and elsewhere, age verification is typically done by third party companies using methods that transmit no personal information to porn sites. These are among the best practices we would expect in Canada as well.

It has been said that this bill would block all forms of nudity. False. The bill uses the standard definition of pornography found in the Criminal Code. The bill also provides for usual exceptions for art, science and education.

It has been said that this bill would impose age verification on all websites. False. Bill S-210 only requires age verification to access porn content. If a website contains porn and non-porn content, age verification is only required to access the porn content.

It has been said that there's no way to check someone's age without compromising privacy. False. France is developing a double anonymous method. The U.K. regulator has recommended age estimation approaches that collect no information. Australia has explained its recent decision to move ahead with age verification by saying that the technology it looked at only a year ago has already improved.

Finally, it has been said that age verification is useless because kids will find ways around it. This is once again false. Actual studies show that only a small number of children know how to evade these restrictions. It's possible that some older teenagers and adults will use VPNs to bypass age verification, but it's highly unlikely that large numbers of eight, 10 and 12-year-olds will do so.

I will be happy to take questions, but please, please, don't let Canada be the last place on earth where pornographers are more protected than children.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you very much. That was 11 seconds over time. That's pretty good; we'll let it go.

We'll go to questions by Mr. Genuis for six minutes, please.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Senator.

I'm going to go quite quickly through a series of questions. I'd be grateful if you could be as short as possible—even providing a yes or no answer where appropriate.

You said that for the Senate study, there were 24 witnesses and 28 briefs. Is that correct?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Yes. It was in two committees, because we had to do it twice. The bill passed twice in the Senate.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

After those hearings, the bill was passed unanimously and unopposed by all senators. Is that correct?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay.

Does Bill S-210 create or call for the creation of a digital ID?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Absolutely not.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Would it be possible to use the provisions of this bill to create a digital ID?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

No. There's zero mention of a digital ID in this bill.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you.

Bill S-210 requires that some age verification method be used, but it does not prescribe the method. Is that correct? Why not explicitly define the age verification method in statute?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Well, this is how we write proper legislation. Age verifications are technical by nature. We have said in the bill—it's very clear in clause 11—that precautions have to be taken, best practice has to be used and privacy has to be respected. But to choose an age verification method in the bill would be a grave error, because those techniques change. We want it in the regulation that the specialists, the experts and the government choose the best age verification method at the time that they will act on it.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

It's as technology evolves. Okay.

Are there age verification methods that do not involve identity verification?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Yes. I can quote from Ofcom, which is the regulatory agency in Britain, on the kinds of age assurance that could be highly effective. They're at the stage of putting in regulation. They have passed a whole bill about it. They mention face age estimation. You've heard about age estimation. It works by analyzing the features of a user's face to estimate their age, but there's no collection at all of identity. It's done through estimation, plus or minus two years.

That's one of them. There are obviously others.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

So there are others, besides the face method, that would not involve looking at the face but also still provide age estimation without identity.

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Absolutely.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Could the verification process be done by a third party, such that a person's identity could never be linked with their pornography use habits, even if there were a data breach?

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Once again, if you look at our bill, clause 11 says that “best practices” have to be followed. Obviously, third party verification is one of the best practices. This is what Germany, France and the U.K. are proposing or have implemented already. The idea, obviously, is not to give any personal data to either porn sites or platforms on the web—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Just to clarify, that separates the verification from the site.

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You get confirmation of age, and then you take that somewhere else.

[Julie Miville-Dechêne]

Well, it's called, in fact, double anonymity, because on one side, the third party does the verification with all the best practices and submits to all the privacy laws. It just sends to the porn sites a token. The only question is whether this customer is 18 years old or more. The porn site never knows who is coming to the porn site.