The most dangerous Canadian internet bill you've never heard of

The Most Dangerous Canadian Internet Bill You’ve Never Heard Of Is a Step Closer to Becoming Law | Michael Geist:

December 14, 2023 - "After years of battles over Bills C-11 and C-18, few Canadians will have the appetite for yet another troubling Internet bill. But given a bill that envisions government-backed censorship, mandates age verification to use search engines or social media sites, and creates a framework for court-ordered website blocking, there is a need to pay attention. Bill S-210, or the Protecting Young Persons from Exposure to Pornography Act, was passed by the Senate in April after Senators were reluctant to reject a bill framed as protecting children from online harm. The same scenario appears to be playing out in the House of Commons, where yesterday a majority of the House voted for the bill at second reading, sending it to the Public Safety committee for review. 

"The bill, which is the brainchild of Senator Julie Miville-Duchêne, is not a government bill. In fact, government ministers voted against it. Instead, the bill is backed by the Conservatives, Bloc and NDP with a smattering of votes from backbench Liberal MPs. Canadians can be forgiven for being confused that after months of championing Internet freedoms, raising fears of censorship, and expressing concern about CRTC overregulation of the Internet, Conservative MPs were quick to call out those who opposed the bill (the House sponsor is Conservative MP Karen Vecchio).... 

"I should preface criticism of the bill by making it clear that underage access to inappropriate content is indeed a legitimate concern.... However, Bill S-210 goes well beyond personal choices to limit underage access to sexually explicit material on Canadian sites. Instead, it envisions government-enforced global website liability for failure to block underage access, backed by website blocking and mandated age verification systems that are likely to include face recognition technologies. The government establishes this regulatory framework and is likely to task the CRTC with providing the necessary administration. While there are surely good intentions with the bill, the risks and potential harms it poses are significant....

"Bill S-210 ... creates an offence for any organization making available sexually explicit material to anyone under the age of 18 for commercial purposes. The penalty for doing so is $250,000 for the first offence and up to $500,000 for any subsequent offences.... The enforcement of the bill is left to the designated regulatory agency, which can issue notifications of violations to websites and ... the steps the agency wants followed to bring the site into compliance. This literally means the government via its regulatory agency will dictate to sites how they must interact with users.... If the site fails to act as instructed within 20 days, the regulator can apply for a court order mandating that Canadian ISPs block the site from their subscribers. The regulator would be required to identify which ISPs are subject to the blocking order. The website blocking provisions are focused on limiting user access and can therefore be applied to websites anywhere in the world with Canadian ISPs required to ensure that the sites are rendered inaccessible.... 

"The bill not only envisions the possibility of blocking lawful content or limiting access to those over 18, it expressly permits it. Section 9(5) states that if the court determines that an order is needed, it may have the effect of preventing access to 'material other than sexually explicit material made available by the organization' or limiting access to anyone, not just young people. This raises the prospect of full censorship of lawful content under court order based on notices from a government agency. 

"If that isn’t bad enough, there are two additional serious concerns. First, the bill is not limited to pornography sites. Rather, it applies to any site or service that makes sexually explicit materials available. This would presumably include search engines, social media sites such as Twitter, or chat forums such as Reddit, where access to explicit material is not hard to find. If the bill was limited solely to sites whose primary purpose is the commercial distribution of sexually explicit material, it might be more defensible. As it stands now, the overbroad approach leaves this bill vulnerable to constitutional challenge.

"Second, consider the way sites are supposed to comply with the law, by establishing age verification systems. This effectively means that sites will require their users to register with commercial age verification systems in order to run a search or access some tweets. And the age verification systems raise real privacy concerns, including mandated face recognition as part of the verification process."

"Senate private members bills rarely become law, but this bill is suddenly on the radar screen in a big way. The bill should not have come this far and should not be supported. Creating safeguards for underage access to inappropriate content is a laudable goal, but not at the cost of government-backed censorship, mandated face recognition, and age-approval requirements to use some of the most popular sites and services in the world."

Read more: https://www.michaelgeist.ca/2023/12/the-most-dangerous-canadian-internet-bill-youve-never-heard-of-is-a-step-closer-to-becoming-law/

The End Of Online Privacy In Canada? A Lawyer Explains Bill S-210 | Runkle Of The Bailey | December 14, 2023:

With Paul out, Justin Amash endorses Ted Cruz

Why I Trust Ted Cruz - Juarin Amash, Independent Journal:

February 23, 2016 - "As a libertarian Republican, I have spent several months promoting the candidacy of my friend Senator Rand Paul... Since his departure from the presidential race, I’ve been asked many times: what now? It’s easy to withdraw from politics when the positions and priorities of the candidates do not precisely mirror our own. But we owe it to our beliefs to find constitutional conservative political allies who not only respect our philosophy but also fight for our views to be heard.

"We have found such an ally in Senator Ted Cruz.

"Ted is not a libertarian and doesn’t claim to be. But he is a principled defender of the Constitution, a brilliant strategist and debater who can defeat the Democratic nominee in the general election, and the only remaining candidate I trust to take on what he correctly calls the Washington Cartel....

"The recent passing of Justice Antonin Scalia reminds us of the importance of electing a president committed to nominating justices to the Supreme Court who will uphold the Constitution and the Rule of Law.... In this regard, history has given us a uniquely qualified candidate — Ted Cruz served as a Supreme Court clerk (an extraordinarily selective job held each year by fewer than 40 lawyers who work directly with the justices to shape the Court’s opinions) and has the rare distinction of having argued many cases before the Supreme Court....

"Ted has consistently led the fight in the Senate against the Washington Cartel’s trillion-dollar omnibus spending bills.... Ted Cruz recognizes that we grow the Republican Party by embracing new approaches that genuinely reflect our support for limited, constitutional government....

"Unlike his competitors, Ted understands that when we allow the government to pick winners and losers, the American people lose. He isn’t afraid to challenge the rampant corruption in Washington, and he isn’t afraid to champion economic freedom. Ted won the Iowa caucuses with a principled stand against subsidies, even though pundits warned that no one could win the state without pandering to the ethanol lobby.

"On civil liberties and foreign policy, Ted ... was one of only ten Republican senators to stand up for our rights by supporting Rand Paul’s amendment to kill the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 — also known as CISA — a cyberspying bill that violates the privacy of all Americans. And Ted has been a stalwart defender of our Fifth Amendment right to due process, strongly opposing the government’s asserted power to indefinitely detain Americans without charge or trial.

"Like me, Ted ... stands with our troops and will not put them in harm’s way unless necessary to protect our country. Unlike some other Republican candidates, Ted opposed intervening in Libya and voted against arming Syrian rebels, and he will not use our Armed Forces to engage in nation building.

"To defend liberty, we must defend our Constitution. I’m supporting Ted because, knowing him personally and having served with him in Congress over the past few years, I trust him as a conservative ally who consistently listens to my perspective and stands firm for what he believes is right."

Read more: http://opinion.injo.com/2016/02/253437-trust-ted-cruz/
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Inside the FBI's encryption battle with Apple

Inside the FBI's encryption battle with Apple | Technology | The Guardian - Danny Yadron, Spencer Ackerman and Sam Thielman:

February 18, 2016 -"Two weeks ago, the FBI called Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, with a jarring message: the agency wanted Apple to help them hack an iPhone. Apple refused.... 16 February ... a federal magistrate ordered Apple to help the FBI unlock a single iPhone – the phone belonging to one of the killers in the December mass shooting in San Bernardino, California. Apple again refused.

"But this carefully planned legal battle has been months in the making, ... as the government and Apple try to settle whether national security can dictate how Silicon Valley writes computer code....

"On 2 December a husband and wife opened fire on a local government office building in southern California.... One of the suspects, Syed Farook, had worked for the county, which meant the government owned his iPhone 5C. With a search warrant, Apple provided the FBI data from weekly backups Farook made with Apple’s iCloud service. But those backups stopped on 19 October, according to a federal search warrant request.

"FBI investigators believed there was more data about Farook’s motives in the phone but couldn’t get to it without unlocking the device. The phone’s contents were encrypted and Apple didn’t have the four-digit passcode. Modern iPhones also have an optional feature that will erase all data on the phone with 10 incorrect passcode entries. FBI agents weren’t willing to take the risk....

"In the 16 February court order, Apple was told to build software that, when combined with the unique identification number, would allow the FBI to guess Farook’s password as many times as it wanted. The court also ordered Apple to disable a feature that added a delay after multiple incorrect passcode entries. And since a four-digit passcode has only about 10,000 possible combinations, a powerful computer could plow through guesses fairly quickly, a technology executive said.

 "US officials on Wednesday stressed that their request for Apple is only limited to Farook’s phone. 'The judge’s order and our request in this case do not require Apple to redesign its products, to disable encryption or to open content on the phone,' the Justice Department said in a statement on 17 February.

"But Apple said that it would be impossible to limit the technology to this case. Once Apple built such an investigative tool, any iPhone’s security system – even the most modern ones – could be weakened by it, an Apple executive said.... Additionally, Apple’s lawyers are concerned that if a judge validates the FBI’s use of the All Writs Act in this case, it will give the government sweeping authority to dictate how Silicon Valley builds products in the future....

"To Justice Department officials, San Bernardino is a long-awaited test case. In October 2014, the FBI’s James Comey first told a Washington audience that encryption on mobile devices effectively left law enforcement 'dark' to emerging threats. Ever since, officials believed it was only a matter of time until they came upon a case like the San Bernardino shootings: a device from a terrorist whose lock screen they couldn’t bypass by guesswork to get at the data held on the phone, and not in Apple’s iCloud....

"Senior law enforcement officials were briefed on the decision to go after Apple in such a high-profile way, sources said. The FBI also appears to have been preparing its press strategy for the search warrant for weeks."

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/feb/17/inside-the-fbis-encryption-battle-with-apple
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Rand Paul suspends presidential campaign

GOP Race Loses Rand Paul's Tech, Privacy Cred - US News - Tom Risen:

February 3, 2016 - "The Republican presidential campaign lost its biggest privacy advocate on Wednesday when Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky dropped out of the race, leaving doubt about whether the remaining candidates can resonate with the tech community or voters concerned about government surveillance.

"Taking a libertarian stance on Internet issues including encryption and the National Security Agency's snooping has been a key part of Paul's campaign effort to attract tech savvy younger voters, while other Republican candidates make hawkish statements in favor of mass surveillance.

"Tech policy generates less excitement from voters in presidential elections than issues like national security or the economy, however, which in part explains how Paul struggled below 10 percent in most election polls this past year....

"Paul's stance in favor of encryption and limits on government surveillance reflected the positions of numerous companies like Facebook, Apple and Google, and promised to attract funding if his campaign gained traction.

"Paul sparred during debates with candidates including New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie on the issue of warrantless surveillance, countering his argument for an expansion of the NSA's spying powers. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and the state's former governor, Jeb Bush, have also supported expanding the NSA's powers.

"The Kentucky senator has called for more accountability and limits to the spying powers of the NSA , but he opposed USA Freedom Act in protest because he and other privacy advocates argued that it did not go far enough to restrict surveillance....

"Less vocal critics of surveillance in the Republican race remain, however, and now have an opportunity to appeal to Paul's libertarian base by speaking more about privacy rights. These include Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who ... voted for the Freedom Act, and neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who has spoken in favor of requiring security agencies to collect data using court orders."

Read more: http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-02-03/gop-race-loses-rand-pauls-tech-privacy-cred
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Apple CEO defends encyption with 'no backdoors'

Apple’s Tim Cook Lashes Out at White House Officials for Being Wishy-Washy on Encryption - Jenna McLaughlin, The Intercept::

January 12, 2016 - "Apple CEO Tim Cook lashed out at the high-level delegation of Obama administration officials who came calling on tech leaders in San Jose last week, criticizing the White House for a lack of leadership and asking the administration to issue a strong public statement defending the use of unbreakable encryption.

"The White House should come out and say 'no backdoors,' Cook said. That would mean overruling repeated requests from FBI Director James Comey and other administration officials that tech companies build some sort of special access for law enforcement into otherwise unbreakable encryption. Technologists agree that any such measure could be exploited by others....

The Washington Post reported in September that the White House had decided not to pursue legislation against unbreakable encryption. But the intelligence community’s top lawyer was quoted in an email saying that that the administration should be 'keeping our options open … in the event of a terrorist attack or criminal event where strong encryption can be shown to have hindered law enforcement.'

"And Comey has been urging technology companies to voluntarily alter 'their business model' and stop offering end-to-end encryption by default.

"Despite the growing pressure tech companies are feeling from governments worldwide to stop letting terrorists take advantage of their services, Cook has continued to defend the importance of encryption in protecting all digital transactions — from text messages and emails to bank information and medical records.

"Cook has been outspoken in his opposition to the idea that we need to sacrifice privacy and digital security for the sake of public safety. During an episode of 60 Minutes on December 20, he said, 'We’re America, we should have both'....

"[T]echnologists and cryptographers have been insisting for decades almost unanimously that trying to pierce impenetrable end-to-end encryption to provide the government with access would be more dangerous than beneficial."

Read more: https://theintercept.com/2016/01/12/apples-tim-cook-lashes-out-at-white-house-officials-for-being-wishy-washy-on-encryption/
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Tech, libertarian groups press for strong encryption

Tech, libertarian groups up pressure on Obama on encryption | TheHill - Cory Bennett:

October 7, 2015 - ""In two separate letters, a major tech trade group and a libertarian-leaning coalition pressed President Obama to publicly support strong encryption, even if it locks out law enforcement officials.

"'As organizations committed to free markets and limited government, we urge your administration to take a clear stand in support of the individual’s right to protect his or her security and privacy with strong encryption technology,' said one letter, signed by groups like TechFreedom and the Niskanen Center.

"''Regardless of good intentions, any efforts to undermine the security and effectiveness of strong encryption are misguided, shortsighted, impractical and ultimately counterproductive,” said a second letter from Ed Black, CEO of the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which represents major tech players like Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft.

"The letters come a week after privacy advocates and digital rights groups officially petitioned the White House to take the same stance.

"The combination has created a unique and powerful coalition pressing the White House on encryption.

"The Obama administration has been considering possible proposals that would give law enforcement guaranteed access to encrypted communications. Silicon Valley, privacy advocates and technologists have pushed back against this, arguing any such access makes encryption vulnerable to hackers and cyber spies.... Officials have countered that without access, investigators may not be able to get legitimate data on criminals and terrorists, even when armed with a warrant....

"In recent weeks, leaked memos have shown the White House is considering backpedaling from its desire for a technological solution that would let investigators bypass encryption.

"Privacy advocates have jumped on these signals, collecting signatures on a petition that would require the White House to publicly respond to a call for it to support full encryption.... As of Wednesday, the appeal had collected over 48,000 signatures in nine days."

Read more: http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/256281-tech-libertarian-groups-up-pressure-on-obama-in-encryption-fight
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Google resists FBI 'fishing' in Benton's e-mails

Google Won’t Let the Government See the Emails of Rand Paul's Aides | Mother Jones - Russ Choma:

Aug. 19, 2015 - "In the summer of 2014, federal investigators began probing whether Ron Paul's 2012 presidential campaign had paid Iowa state Sen. Kent Sorenson for his endorsement. After Sorenson confessed, investigators focused on three other men, including current presidential candidate Rand Paul's nephew-in-law, Jesse Benton, whose email account supposedly contained evidence....

"FBI agents got a search warrant that entitled them to read the emails without Benton's cooperation. But the plan did not go smoothly. Benton has a Gmail account, and Google's policy is to notify users when their accounts have been hit with a search warrant. Benton's attorney, Roscoe Howard, promptly filed a motion to block the search warrant, alleging that it was improper, and Google stopped cooperating with the FBI.

"Two weeks ago, Benton and two other top Paul aides ... were indicted on federal charges, including conspiracy, campaign finance violations, and making false statements.... The FBI still hasn't gotten ahold of Benton's emails. Last week, a judge ruled that the FBI had a right to the emails, but once again, Benton resisted and Google agreed....

"'Frighteningly, the government still maintains that it has the right to trample Mr. Benton’s privacy rights and look through every single one of Mr. Benton’s emails, just as if his email account were a warehouse full of documents,' Howard wrote. 'The government’s statement underscores its true intent —to conduct a fishing expedition.'

"The government has now demanded that Google be held in contempt if the company doesn't immediately turn over the emails, and it has argued that Benton and his attorney can raise their concerns at trial if they don't like the way the search warrant was obtained....

"Hanni Fakhoury, a senior staff counsel with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said courts have not yet settled the question of how specific or broad email search warrants should be.... 'This case is smack in the middle of the debate,' Fakhoury says. 'This is a very high-profile and dramatic example of it, because we're talking about half a million emails.'

"Howard, Benton's attorney, wrote in one filing that his client had cooperated fully with investigators and provided a 50,000-page list of all the emails in his account, which may contain as many as 500,000 emails. Howard argues that the government's search warrant is simply too broad, and that Benton's Gmail account contains both personal and political correspondence.

"Google has now officially joined the fight. Its lawyer, Guy Cook, told the court that the company will not turn over Benton's emails. 'Google cannot be held in contempt simply for allowing Mr. Benton to exercise his appellate rights and awaiting the district court’s ruling on the warrant’s validity,' Cook wrote. The company's position is that it will release emails only after the conflict over the search warrant has been resolved in court.

"A Google spokeswoman declined to discuss the case specifically but said the company won't comply with overly broad requests."

Read more: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/08/google-jumps-legal-fight-over-paul-aides
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Canadian charged for not giving up phone password

Man charged for refusing to give border guards his phone password | CTV News - Josh Dehaas:

March 5, 2015 - "Canadian border officials in Halifax have charged a man after he refused to hand over the passcode for his smartphone, but an expert in the law says it’s not clear whether such demands are legal.

"Alain Philippon is charged with 'hindering' under section 153.1 of the Customs Act, according to Canadian Border Services Agency representative Cindy MacKenzie.

"That section of the Customs Act, which governs border inspections, reads: 'No person shall, physically or otherwise, do or attempt to do any of the following: (a) interfere with or molest an officer doing anything that the officer is authorized to do under this Act; or (b) hinder or prevent an officer from doing anything that the officer is authorized to do under this Act.'

"Rob Currie, Director of the Law & Technology Institute at Dalhousie University’s law school, said it’s [an] 'open question' whether border security can demand passcodes and then search electronic devices, because the question has not been tested in Canadian courts....

"'Customs officials do have quite a license to fish,' he said. 'They have a fairly broad discretionary power and we have said through parliament that that’s a good thing, that we want them to have those powers to search things where they have reasonable grounds at all (to) suspect something untoward.'

"He said that the Supreme Court of Canada’s recent 4-3 decision that police can conduct limited searches of suspects' cellphones without warrants does not apply here.

"If found guilty, Phillipon faces a minimum fine of $1,000 and a maximum fine of $25,000, 'and could include possible jail time,' according to the CBSA’s MacKenzie."

Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/man-charged-for-refusing-to-give-border-guards-his-phone-password-1.2266576
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Supreme Court ruling hasn't stopped warrantless data requests in Canada

Supreme Court ruling hasn’t stopped police from warrantless requests for data | Toronto Star - Alex Boutillier:

September 17, 2014 - "Police in Canada used to ask telecom companies to voluntarily hand over data on Canadian customers more than a million times per year. In June, the Supreme Court struck down this warrantless method as an invasion of privacy.

"But while the number of warrantless requests has dropped since the decision, they have not stopped, an investigation by the Star and the Halifax Chronicle Herald has found. Key players, including the country’s largest police force and a major telecom, aren’t saying whether they still send or accept them.

"Another of Canada’s 'big three' telecoms, Rogers, started demanding warrants for all requests after the June ruling, known as the Spencer decision. Even after this policy change, the company continues to receive warrantless requests, according to Ken Engelhart, vice-president of regulatory affairs at Rogers....

"TELUS confirmed in a statement that they also require a warrant to access such data in all but the most extreme circumstances. The company did not disclose, however, if it is still receiving warrantless requests....

"The last of Canada’s 'big three' telecoms, Bell, has repeatedly refused interview requests on the issue."

Read more: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/09/17/supreme_court_ruling_hasnt_stopped_police_from_warrantless_requests_for_data.html
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Rand Paul, Tea Party ask for debate on Patriot Act

Rand Paul and Tea Party Ask For Debate on Patriot Act Impact On Privacy : NPR - Liz Halloran, May 28, 2011:

"It's been nearly a decade since Congress, in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, hastily approved the USA Patriot Act and its historic expansion of law enforcement and domestic intelligence-gathering powers.... This week, the Senate failed again to have a robust back-and-forth on expiring provisions of the act that allow wide latitude in surveillance of Americans.

"But freshman Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican and Tea Party favorite, raised a ruckus with leaders of both parties over the lack of debate, and forced the issue into the spotlight briefly but potently....

"Paul has since been hailed by civil libertarians and privacy activists for reinvigorating the debate over what rights Americans, in the name of counterterrorism, may have sacrificed. 'It is amazing how much he's been able to drive attention to this by breaking the cozy agreement between Republicans who didn't want to revisit the Patriot Act, and Democrats who didn't want to call too much attention to it,' says ... a longtime advocate of Patriot Act reform."