Exemption illusion: Why govt’s plan to fast track Bill C-34 means no standards, no privacy review, and no enforcement

Michael Geist: One of the most heavily promoted features of Bill C-34, the government’s Safe Social Media Act, is that its social media ban for those under 16 comes with a potential exemption for platforms that satisfy the new Digital Safety Commission that they provide adequate safeguards for children. But based on comments from government officials, it appears the exemption is an illusion, at least for years to come. The legislation carefully sets out how the ban is supposed to work, but officials at a technical briefing on the bill this week described a very different plan that involves moving quickly after Royal Assent with regulations to bring the ban into force without waiting for the Digital Safety Commission to be fully operational. No Commission means no age verification standards, no privacy review, no exemption, and no effective enforcement. It also creates huge risks since the initial start of the ban is when tens of millions of Canadians would be required to verify their age, yet the government is sidelining the privacy protections written into its own bill and essentially conceding that the ban is unlikely to carry any real consequences for those services that fail to comply when it first takes effect…