Canadian senators envision age verification laws going beyond porn websites. This as it passes the senate.
We all know what a failure age verification is. Whether that is people responding by flocking to VPNs, the technology being a complete disaster, the fact that such laws are legally questionable, the fact that the laws are pushed for highly questionable reasons, leads to large services blocking the region altogether, or the fact that the technology is a privacy and security disaster, age verification has long been a complete and total failure.
In fact, age verification is such a failure, for lawmakers that have passed age verification are scrambling to come up with laws that will force the failed technology to work. A great example of this is lawmakers responding by demanding that VPNs get banned altogether.
While the failure of these laws is ridiculously and painfully obvious, mainstream media, who have long supported such laws for the simple reason that it hurts the internet (something they see as their competition), have gone to the extreme angle of completely re-writing history and arguing that everything in the world of age verification is fine and dandy and that it’s up to other countries to simply ‘catch up’ to the countries already implementing these laws.
For some countries, this pro age verification propaganda and disinformation is working as countries like France and Ireland have also been pushing for these failed laws. It is truly a sign that lawmakers well and truly live in their own reality bubbles because if they believe that these laws are sensible, then they are completely divorced from reality.
Another country whose lawmakers have become divorced from reality is, sadly, Canada. There has been a long push to pass Bill S-209, Canada’s own awful age verification law. Today, I learned that the Canadian senate has passed with only Senator Paula Simons opposing the law. From Michael Geist:
Senate committee approves S-209, which has become a trojan horse online harms bill that envisions giving the government the power to mandate age verification and site blocking for a myriad of websites that go well beyond just pornography sites.
@senatorpaulasimons.bsky.social only one to oppose it.
While the original Bill S-210 pretended to limit the scope to just pornographic websites, it seems that senators have dispensed with all pretense and just admitted that the legislation applies to pretty much every website out there:
Few Canadians are paying attention as Senate committee approves creating government power mandating that virtually any site – social media, AI, search – require age verification under threat of court-ordered blocking in Canada. Bill S-209 about far more than pornography sites.
This is mass government censorship and surveillance in action. If you don’t comply with these demands as a website outside of the country, then the Canadian government internet censors are coming after you. This was no accident. This was apparently the intent:
During Bill S-209 clause-by-clause review, Senator @jmivilledechene.bsky.social confirms that she wants bill to potentially go beyond pornography sites. Argues need option to cover broad range of sites, including social media. Would raise possibility of court ordered blocking of social media.
Probably the only good news in all of this is the fact that this legislation is very blatantly unconstitutional. It would very easily open the door to court challenges as these challenges would easily drag on for years following passage.
Canada is heading towards the very same quagmire that has enveloped Australia and the UK. There were a lot of lessons to be learned from Australia, several US states, and the UK, but the sad reality is the fact that Canada has refused to learn from any of that. Instead, the Canadian senate has chosen to hold on to the cult like belief that age verification technology is perfect in every way and that it’s an obligation to pass these laws enforcing the use of these pieces of technology. As a result, Canada is one step closer to repeating the disastrous history experienced in multiple places around the world.
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Well Shit. But yes blatant unconstitutional overreach. Here’s hoping the house doesn’t have it’s debate/committee time cut short/filibustered again. For what its worth, the LPC seem to be in a stronger position to oppose this time, (if they, IF). But could see Bill S210 being twisted into protecting Canadian digital sovereignty vs US tech comps. NDP dont cuck and vote for it this time please.
*NDP dont cuck out and DO NOT vote in favor this time around.
im more worried about the new liberal government. we have yet to determine the stance they’ll take this time since there has been a bunch of changes and Carny is more of a centrist than a left leaning. That being said he does have LGBTQ familiy members so may not be that big of a worry.
as for NDP, they said they voted yes to sent it to committee last time just to see what kind of changes the committee would make since the idea of the bill was good (no one wants kids to see that) but the execution is the issue and a privacy nightmare. since the committee did F-all to it because of Garret’s filibuster preventing any time to do meetings on that they said at least when asked on places like reddit they’d probably vote no in the final vote.
might want to change the title. it isnt passed YET it isnt back in the senate yet to do so, they just finalized the clause by clause reading as committee agreed to a few things and will finalize thing to send it back to the senate after. still got 1 or 2 meetings before its all finalized to send to the house.
also since I cant edit comments they did remove a few things from the bill, mainly the bits that allow for the blocking of websites and said they’ll leave that up to the courts to determine the scope of how to block non-compliance.
Liberals might end up in favor since they have a rather heavy “for the kids” bill in the form of C-16, and who knows what the flying fuck they have in store for the country in the form of the revised Online Harms legislation (the bill once again being in the Culture Ministry’s (ex-Heritage Min.) sector).
Brief rundown of the shitshow the government wants enacted or whatnot:
C-2 – lawful access (it was never dropped, it’s still a live bill)
C-8 – ‘cybersecurity act’, they resurrected C-26, its literately (nearly word-for-word) the same bill from before Carney’s election.
C-16 – criminalizes deepfakes (both real and fictional, FYI) and significantly broadens the parties required to report CSAM (this MAY or may not include VPNs, both home and abroad, good chance the courts will affirm it). The rather ambitious thing found in C-16 is legislating ‘AG of Quebec v. Senneville’ out of existence…by reinforcing the fact mandatory minimum sentences are a feature, not a charter violating bug, a classic knee-jerk legislative reaction to an unfavorable SCC ruling.
Online Harms – seriously doubt the government even listened to reason and are rehashing C-63’s bad portions. There are heavy rumors that the government is leaning in favor of a U-15 Social Media ban now that such legislation is spreading like wildfire.