Law Bytes
by Michael Geist
Latest episode
Episode 280: A Fall Update on Where Things Stand on Canadian Digital…
Episode 280: A Fall Update on Where Things Stand on Canadian Digital…
About this podcast
In recent years the intersection between law, technology, and policy has exploded as digital policy has become a mainstream concern in Canada and around the world. This podcast explores digital policies in conversations with people studying the legal and policy challenges, set the rules, or are experts in the field. It provides a Canadian perspective, but since the internet is global, examining international developments and Canada’s role in shaping global digital policy is be an important part of the story.
Lawbytes is hosted by Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa, where he holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law and where he is a member of the Centre for Law, Technology and Society.
Episodes
The newest 20 of 233 episodes
- Episode 280: A Fall Update on Where Things Stand on Canadian Digital Policy Reforms · 28 minParliament is back in full swing and with it debate on a wide range of digital bills, including lawful access, social media rules, AI regulation, and privacy reform. This week’s…
- Episode 279: My Keynote on Digital Sovereignty: Control, Choice, and Connection · 27 minThe Lawbytes podcast returns after a brief hiatus in late summer and early fall by turning to the debate on data and digital sovereignty. Last week, I was pleased to deliver the…
- Episode 278: Ben Waldman on Gander Social and the Challenges of Building a Sovereign Social Network · 34 minSovereignty, whether digital sovereignty, data sovereignty, or AI sovereignty, has been the hot-button issue in Canada for months. Governments have shifted policies in hopes of…
- Episode 277: Kate Robertson on the Risks That Lie Behind Canada's Unexpected Signing of the UN Cybercrime Convention · 46 minThe Canadian government’s surprise decision to sign the UN Cybercrime Convention has sparked many questions about the convention, its risks, and what changed over the past nine…
- Episode 276: Information Commissioner Caroline Maynard on Canada’s Access to Information Failures and Why Access Delayed is Access Denied · 34 minDespite repeated studies and promises for reform, Canada’s access to information system has long been plagued by long delays, overbroad exclusions, insufficient resources, and an…
- Episode 275: David Loukidelis on Why Stripping Privacy Enforcement from Canada’s Privacy Commissioner in Bill C-36 is Unnecessarily Risky Policy · 32 minThe government’s privacy reform bill was supposed to earn applause for its effort to modernize outdated rules and provide Canadians with stronger privacy protections. Yet the…
- Episode 274: Mark Musselman on What Stakeholders Really Think About the Government’s Reversal of the CRTC Online Streaming Act Decision · 32 minEarlier this month, the government shocked the culture sector by announcing it was effectively reversing the CRTC decision that implemented the Online Streaming Act. Culture…
- Episode 273: Rebroadcast of the Globe and Mail’s The Decibel on Canada’s First Steps Towards a Social Media Ban · 29 minBill C-34, the Safe Social Media Act, has quickly become a lightning rod for debate since its introduction earlier this month. The issue that invariably tops the list is the…
- Episode 272: Build Canada’s Lucy Hargreaves on Canada’s AI Strategy and the Need to Shift From Being Users to Builders · 35 minThe release of the government’s AI strategy has sparked a wide range of reactions and a flurry of additional legislative initiatives. While the legislative side is being fleshed…
- Episode 271: Taking Stock of a Wild Week in Canadian Digital Policy With the Online Streaming Reversal, AI Strategy Release, and Lawful Access Review · 19 minIn the span of a few days last week, the government announced it was reversing the CRTC’s Online Streaming Act ruling, released its long-awaited national AI strategy, and kept…
- Episode 270: Roundtable on the Bill C-22 Risks for Canadian Tech Companies Featuring VPN Services Tailscale and Windscribe · 29 minOver the past week, the concerns over Bill C-22, the government’s lawful access bill, continued to mount. Many companies, notably including Apple, Google, Meta, Signal, and…
- Episode 269: Inside the Bill C-22 Committee Hearing for the Case Against Government’s Lawful Access Plans · 34 minThe government’s lawful access bill has been the target of criticism for weeks, with companies, governments, and experts on privacy and security all sounding the alarm. Much of…
- Episode 268: Sara Grimes on the Moral Panic Behind Banning Kids from Social Media and AI Chatbots · 48 minThe question of children’s social media and AI chatbot ban has emerged as one of the most talked-about digital policy issues in recent memory. Premiers, the Liberal convention…
- Episode 267: Peter Nowak on Rogers, the Shaw Merger Aftermath, and the Limits of Canadian Telecom Policy · 36 minThe recent announcement that Rogers is offering buyouts to half of its workforce is just the tip of the iceberg in a series of developments involving one of Canada’s dominant…
- Episode 266: Justin Safayeni on the Ontario Government's Overnight Evisceration of Access to Information · 43 minJust over a month ago, the Ford government tabled Bill 97, an omnibus bill with provisions fundamentally restructuring Ontario's access to information system. Information and…
- Ep. 265 - Jason Millar on Claude Mythos, Project Glasswing, and the Governance Crisis in Frontier AI · 35 minIn a year in which AI has truly dominated much of the news cycle, the story of Anthropic’s Mythos may be the biggest story of them all. A version of the popular Claude AI service…
- Episode 264: Jon Penney on Chilling Effects in the Digital Age · 42 min“Chilling effects” is a term people hear all the time: in court rulings, in debates over content moderation, in dealing with online harms, or in news coverage of surveillance and…
- Episode 263: The Lawful Access Act Roundtable With David Fraser and Robert Diab · 59 minLawful access is back. The decades-long battle has entered a new phase with the introduction of Bill C-22, the Lawful Access Act. This bill follows last spring’s attempt to bury…
- Episode 262: Zack Shapiro on the Claude AI Native Law Firm · 43 minWhat are the limits of using AI to help run a legal practice? There is much discussion about what an AI future might look like, but with the rapid development of AI tools, the…
- Episode 261: Ian Goldberg on the Privacy Risks of Age Assurance Technologies · 32 minAge verification, estimation or inference is seemingly all the rage right now. Vendors are promoting it as the solution to thorny challenges to limit access to certain sites and…
