Information & Ethics committee  You need more government certification to sell a toaster oven than you do to run Facebook or Pornhub. This idea of permissionless entry can be very difficult. Ultimately, I think, the question is can they operate legally. If they can't, we should come down on them. You asked ab

Information & Ethics committee  I think what you're pointing out is that Canada is so far behind on these issues of enforcing the law when it comes to anything that happens digitally. You're right to connect the fraud, the child sexual abuse material, the privacy violations, all of this other illegal activity

Information & Ethics committee  I think Canada already has a pretty strong legal regime coming from hundreds of years of common law. The original case we talked about in our report is over 100 years old and comes from Scotland and involves a defamatory notice on a message board.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I understand. I think the closest comparison I would give is Germany, which has a strong law, in this case talking about illegal hate speech, but again, illegal content. Platforms that are caught facilitating the transmission of this content can face fines of up to 50 milli

Information & Ethics committee  It was just to say that I agree. Platforms want to operate at a certain scale, which requires them not to validate any of the content that comes up, yet that seems to result in illegal outcomes, so it's not really for us to say how they should deal with this, but simply that if i

Information & Ethics committee  My understanding is that they would not. My understanding is that even in the United States, there is an exception to section 230 for child sexual abuse material, so even under the safe harbour laws of the United States, they would not be protected. Ultimately, Mr. Angus, I would

Information & Ethics committee  Thank you, Ms. Gaudreau. I just wish to comment on something Ms. McDonald said, to disagree in hopes of agreeing with her. It is that I don't believe that the Internet is in fact unregulated. I cannot commit fraud legally on the Internet. I cannot steal legally on the Internet.

Information & Ethics committee  Thank you for the question, Ms. Gaudreau. I think the answer is that the incidents are international, but they are also very local. Pornhub, MindGeek, is arguably Canada's largest Internet media company. Mr. Antoon lives in Canada, has property in Canada and is fully subject to

Information & Ethics committee  I'm sorry. The Internet providers are conspiring against me here. We're talking about a difference between American law, which holds companies that deal in user-generated content indemnified from that content, and Canadian law, which does not. In Canada, as our report documents

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I think you're entirely right. I'm glad you mentioned Facebook, because to some extent I think the sexual nature, the shocking nature of this illegal activity can allow us to focus too much. The general question is: Are these platforms responsible for illegal activity that

Information & Ethics committee  Thank you.

Information & Ethics committee  Thank you, Mr. Sorbara. You've touched on a key point, which is the difference between the law in Canada and the law in the United States. In the United States, there has been a lot of talk about the Communications Decency Act and section 230 of that act, which holds platforms

Information & Ethics committee  Madam Chair, honourable members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to appear today. My name is Daniel Bernhard, and I am the executive director of Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, an independent citizens' organization that promotes Canadian culture, values and sovereig

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you very much. I will speak to two of them, if I may. In the first instance, I have to find myself agreeing with Professor Geist—which is a rare and, in this case, fortunate opportunity—that thresholds for the regulation of digital broadcasters really—

Canadian Heritage committee  Sorry about that. The thing keeps cutting out. Can you hear me now?