Michael Geist

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Digital Canada 150: Why the Canadian Strategy Misses Key Issues and Lags Behind Peer Countries

In my first post on Digital Canada 150, Canada’s digital strategy, I argued that it provided a summation of past accomplishments and some guidance on future policies, but that it was curiously lacking in actual strategies and goals. Yesterday I reviewed how Canada’s universal broadband access target lags behind much of the OECD (Peter Nowak characterizes the target as the Jar Jar Binks of the strategy). The problems with Digital Canada 150 extend far beyond connectivity, however. In comparing the Canadian strategy with countries such as Australia and the United Kingdom, it becomes immediately apparent that other countries offer far more sophisticated and detailed visions for their digital futures. While there is no requirement that Canada match other countries on specific goals, it is disappointing that years of policy development – other countries were 5 to 10 years ahead of Canada – ultimately resulted in a document short on strategy, specifics, and analysis.

For example, compare the clarity of goals between Canada and the Australia strategy:

April 9, 2014 — 1 comment — News

Digital Canada 150: Why Canada’s Universal Broadband Goal is Among the Least Ambitious in the OECD

The release of Digital Canada 150, the federal government’s long-awaited digital strategy, included a clear connectivity goal: 98 percent access to 5 Mbps download speeds by 2019. While the government promises to spend $305 million on rural broadband over the next five years and touts the goal as “a rate that enables e-commerce, high-resolution video, employment opportunities and distance education”, the reality is that Canada now has one of the least ambitious connectivity goals in the developed world.

Just how badly does the government’s connectivity ambitions compare to other OECD countries? Consider just some of the target speeds from other countries as compiled three years ago by the OECD:

April 8, 2014 — 11 comments — News

Digital Canada 150: The Digital Strategy Without a Strategy

Four years after the Canadian government first announced plans to develop a digital economy strategy, Industry Minister James Moore traveled to Waterloo, Ontario, Friday for the release of Digital Canada 150. The long-awaited strategy document identifies five key areas for policy development: connecting Canadians, protecting the online environment, developing commercial opportunities, digital government, and Canadian content.

My weekly technology law column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) argues the release of Digital Canada 150 succeeds on at least three levels. First, it puts to rest the longstanding criticism that the government is uninterested in digital issues. Moore quickly emerged as the government’s digital leader after taking the reins at Industry Canada, promptly focusing on wireless competition, spam regulation, and now a digital strategy. After years of complaints that the digital strategy issue was Ottawa’s equivalent of the “Penske File” – all talk and no action – Moore has acted.

April 5, 2014 — 6 comments — Columns

U.S. Calls Out Canadian Data Protection as a Trade Barrier

The U.S. Trade Representative issued its annual Foreign Trade Barrier Report on Monday. In addition to identifying the geographical indications provisions in the Canada – EU Trade Agreement, telecom foreign ownership rules, and Canadian content regulations as barriers, the USTR discussed regulations on cross-border data flows. I wrote about the […]

April 2, 2014 — 11 comments — News

How Telcos and ISPs Hand Over Subscriber Data Thousands of Times Each Year Without a Warrant

The lawful access fight of 2012, which featured then-Public Safety Minister Vic Toews infamously claiming that the public could side with the government or with child pornographers, largely boiled down to public discomfort with warrantless access to Internet subscriber information. The government claimed that subscriber data such as name, address, and IP address was harmless information akin to data found in the phone book, but few were convinced and the bill was ultimately shelved in the face of widespread opposition.

My weekly technology law column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) notes the government resurrected the lawful access legislation last year as a cyber-bullying bill, but it has been careful to reassure concerned Canadians that the new powers are subject to court oversight. While it is true that Bill C-13 contains several new warrants that require court approval (albeit with a lower evidentiary standard), what the government fails to acknowledge is that telecom companies and Internet providers already hand over subscriber data hundreds of times every day without court oversight. In fact, newly released data suggests that the companies have established special databases that grant law enforcement quick access to subscriber information without a warrant for a small fee.

April 1, 2014 — 2 comments — Columns