Newsletter: October 6, 2020

Weekly News (October 6, 2020)
Compiled by Fizza Kulvi and Erica Rzepecki with Sara Bannerman
McMaster University, Communications Governance Observatory

(September 29 – October 5, 2020)

Canadian News

• [HATE SPEECH; PLATFORM GOVERNANCE] Liberal, Conservative MPs join international task force to curb anti-Semitism online (CTV News)
• [INTERNET FUNDING] Trudeau announces new plan for Canada Infrastructure Bank focused on broadband, retrofits and agriculture (Globe & Mail)
• [TELECOMMUNICATIONS REGULATION] CRTC to keep wholesale internet rates steady while reviewing decision to slash prices (Canadian Press via CTV News)
• [TELECOMMUNICATIONS REGULATION] Canada watchdog mum as U.K. agency finds security defects in Huawei gear (The Globe and Mail)
• [TELECOMMUNICATIONS] Wireless carriers urge Ottawa to treat cell tower attacks as national security threat: documents (The Globe and Mail)
• [FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION] Doug Ford’s government abandons unconstitutional gas-pump stickers that railed against federal carbon pricing (The Toronto Star)
• [TELECOMMUNICATIONS REGULATION] CRTC’s undercover shoppers find fault with 1-in-5 interactions with wireless sellers (Canadian Press via The Toronto Star)
• [PRIVACY/PERSONAL INFORMATION] Memo reveals ‘shocking’ police misuse of COVID-19 database, say rights groups (The Toronto Star)
• [ACCESS TO INFORMATION] Complaints from Access to Information users more than doubled last year: info czar (Canadian Press via National Post)
• [BROADCASTING GOVERNANCE] Bell Media part of new Canadian portal promoting BIPOC hiring in media industry (CTV News)
• [CYBERSECURITY] Two Telus Health medical service providers pay ransom after 60K client files accessed (Canadian Press via The Toronto Star)
• [PRIVACY/PLATFORM REGULATION] OPINION: Alang: The COVID Alert app is a key tool in our fight against the virus. But a profound mistrust in big tech is leading Canadians to avoid it (The Toronto Star)
• [PLATFORM REGULATION] OPINION: Dias: Don’t let U.S. tech giants Google and Facebook divide Canadian media (The Toronto Star)
• [SURVEILLANCE/PLATFORM REGULATION] OPINION: Levitt: It’s completely legal for your employer to spy on you — but there’s a catch (The Financial Post)
• [FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION] Dalhousie faculty association investigating president’s letter on Mi’kmaq fishery (Canadian Press via Global News)
• [PRIVACY/EMPLOYEE RIGHTS] OPINION: Bryant: Can City Hall ‘deploy’ contact tracing app on its phones? (The Toronto Star)

International News

• [INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY] India, South Africa ask WTO to ease IP rules for COVID-19 (CTV News)
• [PLATFORM REGULATION] U.S. judge temporarily blocks Trump order on TikTok app store ban (CBC News)
• [SURVEILLANCE/PLATFORM GOVERNANCE] Twitter Partner’s Alerts Highlight Divide Over Surveillance (The Wall Street Journal)
• [DEFAMATION] American Could Face Prison in Thailand After Posting Negative Reviews of a Resort (NYT)
• [PLATFORM GOVERNANCE] Google to pay media publishers over $1 billion for news content (Financial Post)
• [PLATFORM REGULATION] House Democrats to Call for Big Tech Breakups (The Wall Street Journal)
• [CYBERSECURITY] WikiLeaks’ Assange won’t get US extradition ruling this year (The Washington Post)
• [CENSORSHIP/PLATFORM GOVERNANCE] QAnon Lands on LinkedIn, Prompting Networking Site to Limit Spread (The Wall Street Journal)
• [PRIVACY/PLATFORM REGULATION] Andrew Yang takes lead in California data privacy measure (Associated Press via ABC News)
• [PRIVACY/ANTITRUST] Headwinds for Google as rivals, customers criticise Fitbit concessions (Reuters)
• [PRIVACY] Germany fines H&M 35 million euros for data protection breaches (Reuters)

(September 29 – October 5, 2020)

CRTC

• Online educational platform OneClass agrees to pay $100,000 for allegedly violating Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation
• CRTC releases findings of first-ever secret shopper project 

Office of the Information Commissioner

• Information Commissioner releases 2019–20 annual report
• 2020 Information Commissioner’s Award

Microsoft 

• Microsoft report shows increasing sophistication of cyber threats

 Twitter

• Transparency around image cropping and changes to come
• Inclusion & Diversity Report September 2020: #BlackLivesMatter

Facebook

• Celebrating National Voter Registration Day With a Week of Action

 CRTC

News Releases:

• Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2020-347

[2020-10-02 11:00 AM]
Final offer arbitration between Cogeco Connexion Inc. and Bell Media Inc. regarding the distribution of VRAK

• • • Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2020-346
      [2020-10-01 11:00 AM]
      APPROVED – B.C. Conference of the Mennonite Brethren Churches – Abbotsford, British Columbia – Application to change the authorized contours of the community-based religious television programming undertaking CFEG-TV Abbotsford
    • Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2020-343
      [2020-09-29 11:00 AM]
      APPROVED – Harvest Ministries Sudbury – Sudbury and New Liskeard, Ontario – Application to change the authorized contours of CJTK-FM-6 New Liskeard, a rebroadcasting transmitter of the English-language specialty (Christian music) commercial FM radio station CJTK-FM Sudbury

Senate of Canada

• Sitting days this week: October 5 to October 8, 2020

Canadian House of Commons

• Sitting days this week: October 5 – October 9, 2020

CRTC

The CRTC plans to issue the following decisions, regulatory policies and reports in the coming week. This list may be incomplete and is subject to change without notice.

Anticipated releases for the week of Oct 5 – Oct 9, 2020

• Broadcasting Decision: 
  Decision relating to the following Part 1 application: 
  Vista Radio Ltd.
  CFFM-FM-2 Quesnel and CKCQ-FM Quesnel – Technical changes
  Public records: 2020-0504-0 and 2020-0515-7

Upcoming Public Hearings

• CRTC Open Broadcasting Proceedings
• CRTC Open Telecom Proceedings