Online harms bill to create new role
OTTAWA • The federal government tabled its long-awaited online harms bill on Monday and it is already shaping up to become a political battle on freedom of expression on the internet.
Bill C-63 aims to force social media, user-uploaded adult content and livestreaming services to reduce exposure to online content deemed harmful, to strengthen the reporting of child pornography and to better address hate propaganda and provide recourse to victims of hate online.
Harmful content is defined in the legislation as content that incites violence, that foments hatred, that incites violent extremism or terrorism, content used to bully a child, content that sexually victimizes a child, induces a child to harm themselves or intimate content communicated without consent.
The bill also creates a new Digital Safety Commission, which will be responsible for enforcing rules and holding online services accountable, as well as a Digital Safety Ombudsperson, who will support and advocate for users and make recommendations to social media services and the government.
Online services will be forced to remove two categories of content: intimate content communicated without consent or content that sexually victimizes a child or revictimizes a survivor of sexual abuse.
Users of these online services will be able to either flag the content directly on the online service or file a complaint to the Digital Safety Commission. Both channels would screen any frivolous flags or complaints and result in the removal of the content within 24 hours, subject to review.
The legislation also forces online services to adopt special protections for children, such as parental controls, content warning labels for children or automatic disabling of certain features.
Finally, online services will have to continuously assess, mitigate and report on the risk to users posed by their services, provide tools to flag content and block users and create an internal point of contact for user complaints. It will also have to identify measures taken to reduce exposure to harmful content.
Not all online services are covered under the legislation, only those that are above a certain threshold of users, which will be set out in regulation. Private and encrypted messaging services are also excluded.
Bill C-63 also amends the Criminal Code to create a new standalone hate crime offence that would allow penalties up to life imprisonment to deter hateful conduct, as well as raise the maximum punishments for hate propaganda offences from five years to life imprisonment for advocating genocide.
It also amends the Canadian Human Rights Act to specify that posting hate speech online is discrimination.