The Most Dangerous Canadian Internet Bill You’ve Never Heard Of Is a Step Closer to Becoming Law - Michael Geist
The Most Dangerous Canadian Internet Bill You’ve Never Heard Of Is a Step Closer to Becoming Law - Michael Geist
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-ordere...
I think the best way to deal with the issue includes education, digital skills, and parental oversight of Internet use including the use of personal filters or blocking tools if desired.
As a someone who works in technology and is a parent to 2 kids < 10, I'm already aware of what a niave statement that is.
I keep my kids' iPad locked down and have a router with some basic parental control features, but as the number devices in our lives that are able to browse the web increases along with the number of wireless networks my kids can connect to, trying to police this myself is futile.
And I'm not even concerned about them occasionally seeing "normal" porn. As a former Reddit user, I've seen some things I wish I hadn't. Things I'm not able to fully process as an adult.
I can handle the conversation about...
"you know how people drive in Fast and Furious isn't how people drive in real life? That's what porn sex is like compared to the sex you are going to have."
I cannot explain some of the darker corners of Reddit.
If you applied Geist's logic to alcohol, it would be up to parents to keep kids from going to liquor stores. Sure I can stop my kids from drinking the alcohol I have in my own home, but I rely on laws to make it very difficult for them to do something as a community we've agreed they aren't mature enough to make good decisions about.
Why can't we apply the same policies on to internet services?
The difference is that the only way of truly verifying if you are an adult on the internet is extremely privacy-invading. It's not like at the liquor store where a clerk can just look at someone and know that they are too young to be there.
Exactly. Especially since the only way to prove it would be digital, allowing for a digital paper trail to be collected on each person in an area of their lives that is typically very private.
Easy solution to be clean with the law for international companies: Just geoblock Canada.
