{"id":19406,"date":"2026-11-10T12:02:30","date_gmt":"2026-11-10T19:02:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/?p=19406"},"modified":"2026-11-10T12:02:30","modified_gmt":"2026-11-10T19:02:30","slug":"canadas-bill-c-22-could-apply-to-vpns-and-gaming-platforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/2026\/11\/10\/canadas-bill-c-22-could-apply-to-vpns-and-gaming-platforms\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada\u2019s Bill C-22 Could Apply To VPNs And Gaming Platforms"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Canada is also part of the crown with the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, though each has their own political systems and laws, which can ultimately be set aside for the interests of the crown. But this blurb below is pretty striking, as having access to you and your lawyer’s communications is pretty sinister from a state that routinely abuses its power. And actually, the medical communications is also a problem with a government that wants to offer everyone medically assisted suicide as the first option, recently reported that they are offering it to vets with PTSD… More Canadians die via white coats than all those killed by gun violence in the US<\/a>, which is a striking statistic. TLDR, in Canada your life doesn’t matter to the state and they’d like to kill you, especially if a problem in soaking up tax money or resisting the Great Replacement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The bill\u2019s explicit protection of medical<\/u><\/a> and solicitor-client information only applies when police make a warrantless demand for confirmation of service \u2013 but not to the production order.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/reclaimthenet.org\/canadas-bill-c-22-could-apply-to-vpns-and-gaming-platforms<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n
A Senate hearing turned \u201celectronic service provider\u201d into a remarkably elastic phrase.<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Cindy Harper<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The true extent of Canada\u2019s controversial C-22 surveillance bill<\/u><\/a> has been revealed during a Senate hearing, when officials were forced to answer questions from senators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The questioning revealed that the bill is designed to be very broad in its scope \u2013 a point that was conceded by the minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe term electronic service provider is deliberately broad,\u201d Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree told the senators on November 2, as he was trying to defend the proposal that has been criticized as overreaching and poorly defined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Senator Pierre Dalphond raised daycares, and Justice counsel Anne-Marie Lebel<\/u><\/a> replied that an order \u201ccould be made to any service provider, a person who provides services to the public. It could be a daycare in some cases.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Senator Hassan Yussuff asked if a VPN (Virtual Private Network) would qualify as an electronic service provider, and the minister replied, \u201cthe expansion to other platforms is not what is immediately envisioned, although, as technology develops, we want the ability to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The minister also said that \u201ca world in which AI will be able to generate its own electronic service and sell it to Canadians\u201d is \u201csomething the regulation and definition could capture.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assistant Deputy Minister Richard Bilodeau said that whether AI services end up as core providers is a question on which \u201ctime will tell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shannon Hiegel of Public Safety Canada explained that the broad definition of an electronic service provider is \u201cprobably where we\u2019re leaning the most forward when we look at the comparisons across all of the countries that we\u2019ve taken a look at.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill\u2019s definition of an electronic service provider is anyone who provides an electronic service to people in Canada, and the minister can make orders that apply to any such provider.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hiegel said that this would include \u201cgaming platforms where communication isn\u2019t the primary purpose of that service, but yet there is a predominant chat room and chat function that goes on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also emerged during the hearing that the bill\u2019s provisions could reach far beyond telecommunications and internet companies, and that its broad wording could allow it to be used to obtain sensitive information from health care providers, lawyers, and financial institutions, as well as dating apps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is according to Privacy Commissioner Philippe Dufresne, who said that the subscriber information rules in the bill could apply to services \u201cwhich could include health-care providers, lawyers, financial institutions and dating apps,\u201d and that \u201csuch information could reasonably attract a heightened expectation of privacy due to its sensitivity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bill tracker: Canada Bill C-22 (Lawful Access Act)<\/a> \u00b7 In progress \u00b7 We oppose it<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Track this bill \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The production order, which would force these providers to hand over data, requires a judge\u2019s approval, but the bar is set very low, at \u201creasonable grounds to suspect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The privacy commissioner wants to see a finite list of what counts as subscriber information, a carve-out for medical or privileged information, and a limitation of the order to telecommunications providers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another problem is that the bill does not define what is meant by \u201cpublicly available\u201d information \u2013 something that Dufresne said was undefined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAn individual does not automatically forfeit any reasonable expectation of privacy in information that has become public,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, Intelligence Commissioner Simon No\u00ebl spoke about secret ministerial orders that would force companies to build surveillance capabilities, and said that \u201ca clear proportionality factor that includes reasonable alternatives would ensure the minister explains the needs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bill\u2019s explicit protection of medical<\/u><\/a> and solicitor-client information only applies when police make a warrantless demand for confirmation of service \u2013 but not to the production order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite these and other criticisms, the government is trying to defend its bill. A spokesperson for the minister<\/u><\/a>, Simon Lafortune, said, \u201cBill C-22 does not authorize indiscriminate surveillance and does not permit or compel companies to introduce systemic vulnerabilities or so-called \u2018backdoors\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, four cryptography and privacy academics who submitted a brief to the committee<\/u><\/a> said that the bill risks \u201cserious harm to Canadian citizens, companies, and government agencies\u201d and could \u201copen up attack vectors for the least trusted countries and bad actors in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the co-authors of the brief, Peter Swire, said, \u201cIf local protocols are broken, users in Canada can decide to use open-source models or use services that are hosted in other countries where the Canadian law can\u2019t require broken encryption.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meta, meanwhile, said in its November 4 brief<\/u><\/a> that some of the bill\u2019s provisions \u201ccould jeopardize the ability of service providers to offer encrypted services\u201d \u2013 and that the data retention obligations \u201ctreat all Canadians like potential criminals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meta also criticized the secrecy requirements, saying they \u201cdisproportionately gag providers and undermine user trust.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Constitutional lawyer Daniel Santoro, whose submission was funded<\/u><\/a> by the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, went so far as to say that \u201cthis bill renders true digital security illegal.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He told Juno News<\/u><\/a> that journalists\u2019 sources are not protected from the warrantless demands for information, adding, \u201cThe failure to include journalist-source confidentiality in this provision means it is not protected.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Reclaim The Net has previously reported<\/u><\/a>, the bill would force providers to keep metadata of all their users for up to six months, regardless of whether they are suspected of any crime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March, Anandasangaree told a gathering of police chiefs that the bill is \u201cnot about the surveillance of honest, hard-working Canadians going on about their daily lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is precisely what it is, and it has the potential to be much worse, critics have said. Some of the bill\u2019s provisions are so egregious that VPNs have said they would have to either log identifying user data, which goes against their business model, or move their headquarters out of Canada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Windscribe said<\/u><\/a> that \u201cin its current state, VPNs would almost certainly require us to log identifying user data\u201d and that it would move its headquarters out of Canada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Signal has also said<\/u><\/a> it would not be able to operate in Canada under the new rules because storing metadata \u201cwould fundamentally break Signal.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is the same government that is now trying to push C-22 through the parliament that in May told citizens, via its Public Safety department, \u201cUsing a VPN protects your data.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A government that writes a law that is so broad it could reach anyone, and then asks citizens to trust it to use its powers sparingly is not addressing the problem \u2013 it is describing the problem. The Senate should not try to trim these powers, but strike them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Canada is also part of the crown with the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, though each has their own political systems and laws, which can ultimately be set aside for the interests of the crown. But this blurb below is pretty striking, as having access to you and your lawyer’s communications is pretty sinister from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech","category-world"],"featured_image_src":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Jason","author_link":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/author\/jturning\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19406"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19407,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19406\/revisions\/19407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonsblog.ddns.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}