Columns

More Transparency Not Police Reporting: Navigating the Safety-Privacy Balance for AI ChatBots

My Globe and Mail op-ed begins by noting that AI Minister Evan Solomon summoned executives from OpenAI to Ottawa last week to explain why the company declined to alert police that it had flagged the account of Jesse Van Rootselaar, the Tumbler Ridge shooter who killed eight people earlier this month. The company stopped short of warning authorities, concluding that the account activity did not meet its standard of an “imminent and credible risk of serious physical harm to others.” After the meeting, Mr. Solomon expressed disappointment with OpenAI, saying the company had not presented “substantial new safety protocols.” Justice Minister Sean Fraser said it expects OpenAI to make changes, or else the government would step in to regulate artificial intelligence companies.

The desire to hold someone responsible for the potential prevention of the Tumbler Ridge tragedy is understandable. Add in the mounting pressure for AI regulation, and OpenAI makes for a perfect target for blame and threats of government action. Yet holding AI chatbots liable for reporting to police what users privately post in their conversations creates its own risks, undermining privacy and effectively encouraging heightened corporate surveillance.

March 3, 2026 — 2 comments — Columns

older-man-reaching-people-045010 https://pixabay.com/ https://picryl.com/media/older-man-reaching-people-045010 CC0 1.0

Why Freedom of Expression Must Not Become a Right to Harass or Intimidate

My latest Globe and Mail op-ed opens by noting that my grandparents arrived in Canada in 1948, seeking to build a new life after surviving the Holocaust and knowing that most of their family had been killed in the death camps. They settled in Toronto, and in their later years moved to the northern part of the city, where my grandfather would go on daily walks in his predominantly Jewish residential area. He passed away many years ago, but those walks came to mind recently as I watched video of masked protesters roaming the same streets in north Toronto, leaving many residents fearful of leaving their homes.

November 25, 2025 — 4 comments — Columns

Kosher by Thomas Hawk https://flic.kr/p/2oPfpPZ CC BY-NC 2.0

Grocery Shopping While Jewish

In my family, it was always the “kosher Loblaws.” Featuring Ottawa’s only large kosher food section, the Loblaws location at College Square in the west end of the city is our destination several times per week for everything from groceries, to prescription refills, to challah bread for Shabbat. My Globe and Mail opinion piece published this weekend notes that as the only such store in Ottawa, it serves as both a place to see familiar faces and a reminder of the small size of the Jewish community here.

Last week, a 71-year-old man from Cornwall, Ont., is alleged to have entered the store and stabbed a Jewish grandmother multiple times in the back. The grandmother, well known in the Jewish community here, is thankfully now at home recovering. But the initial fears that this might be an antisemitic attack appear to have been borne out, as a review of the alleged attacker’s social media feed reveals a steady stream of antisemitic hate stretching back years. On Friday, Ottawa police announced they will be investigating the incident as a hate-motivated crime.

For the Jewish community, this means yet more security measures as grocery stores get added to a list that now includes synagogues, community events, schools, senior homes and campus lectures – a growing number of places requiring added security and secrecy to keep the community protected. For individuals, it means rethinking placing mezuzahs on the outside of doors, wearing a kippah or Star of David, or participating in Jewish events, given fears of heightened safety risks. The cumulative effect is the gradual erasure of a visible Jewish presence in Canada.

September 1, 2025 — 18 comments — Columns

FiberOpticWarning2 by Raysonho @ Open Grid Scheduler / Grid Engine CC0 1.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:FiberOpticWarning2.jpg

Let Competition Be the Guide: Why the Government and CRTC Got It Right on Wholesale Fibre Broadband Access

Late last night, Industry Minister Mélanie Joly announced that the government was leaving in place a CRTC decision that granted wholesale access to fibre networks. By sheer coincidence, today the Globe and Mail runs my opinion piece on the issue, in which I argued that maximizing competition regardless of provider should be the guiding principle for the government. I start by noting that the Canadian struggle to foster greater competition in telecom and Internet services dates back decades. As early in the 1970s, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunication Commission (CRTC) mandated that dominant companies such as Bell provide access to their key network infrastructure to open the door to new marketplace entrants. In recent years, the debates have shifted to granting wholesale access to wireless and Internet networks to inject competition into those services.

August 7, 2025 — 3 comments — Columns