Miller Advances Canada Social Media Ban for Under-16s
Canada introduced social media legislation this week that would ban children under 16 from platforms and create a new digital regulator for AI chatbots. Marc Miller, the country’s Identity and Culture Minister, announced the proposal on Wednesday and said Canada was moving to make social media and AI chatbots safer by design.
Miller Links Bill To Shooting
The bill follows national outrage after a February shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, left nine people dead. Miller also said the 18-year-old suspect’s ChatGPT account had been flagged internally for violence but was never reported to police, adding that OpenAI had made “made an egregious human error” in failing to alert Canadian authorities.
Under the proposal, the new agency would require chatbots to reduce the risk of users seeking harmful content. It would also require crisis intervention steps if chatbots discuss suicide and self-harm. The legislation would follow Australia in banning social media for children under 16.
Light Raises Enforcement Questions
Evan Light, an associate professor at the University of Toronto who focuses on technology and privacy, said restrictions on Internet use could be circumvented with VPNs or other means. He said, “If this is the preview of a law, I do not have high hopes for something that will be useful in a practical sense,” a line that points to the gap between a rule on paper and a rule that can be enforced at home.
Miller said the proposal does not apply to private messaging apps like WhatsApp or Signal, and that companies meeting criteria set by the new regulator could receive an exemption from the social media ban. That leaves the regulator with the job of deciding which services qualify, while companies decide whether to seek the exemption.
Meta And Google Response
A Meta spokesperson called social media bans “counterproductive,” while a Google spokesperson said the company is committed to working with the government. The arguments now center on whether the bill can reach the services it targets without missing the routes teenagers already use to move around it.
The practical test comes from the combination of age checks, exemptions, and private messaging carveouts. If the new regulator writes broad criteria, more services could escape the ban; if it writes narrow ones, enforcement will depend on whether users can bypass the system with tools such as VPNs.
