Stop Bill C-22

Stop Bill C-22

Bill C-22 is an illiberal law that pretty much everyone except the Liberals hates.

And yet, the federal Liberals are insisting on forcing the law through Parliament.

If you've already heard about the Bill, and just want to help us fight it, you can sign our petition to Stop Bill C-22 right now.

If you haven't heard about it or just want to know more, then read on:

Bill C-22 is officially called the Lawful Access Act, but it should really be known as the Orwellian Access Act.

It was first proposed under Justin Trudeau, but it was eventually dropped as it was deemed too controversial.

But now it's been brought back under Mark Carney, and - if anything - it's even worse!

Ostensibly, the Bill is designed to give law enforcement agencies more access to data during criminal or national security investigations.

But the Bill's reach, and the implications it could have on your privacy, go far beyond anything that could be considered reasonable.

Here's how the Bill works:

First, it forces the companies that run your phone, app, and internet services to keep detailed records of everything they know about who you communicate with, what you say, when you say it, your physical location history, and more.

Second, it forces those same companies to weaken their own security technology and build back doors into their own encryption systems, so that they can store even more information about you than they would normally have access to.

Third, it makes it easy (like, really easy) for the federal government to access all of that information whenever they want by lowering the standard for access from "reasonable grounds to believe" to "reasonable grounds to suspect" - the lowest standard in all of Canadian law, barely more than a hunch.

Finally, it allows the government to issue secret gag orders to these companies, which make it illegal for these companies to warn you, to push back against the contents of the Bill, or even to tell you that the government accessed your data.

Let me just re-emphasize all that, so you understand just how terrifying this is:

• The government wants to know and have access to every single thing you ever say on or type into a phone, computer, tablet, or any other form of digital device.
  
  
• They want to know and have access to every bit of information you store on any of your internet accounts.
  
  
• They want a complete, geolocated history of everywhere you ever go with any digital device in your pocket or on your body.
  
  
• They want all that information stored and accessible to them.
  
  
• And they want to be able to access it whenever they want, without you even knowing that they accessed it.

Even Orwell would have struggled to believe the audacity of these people!

You also don't have to take our word for any of this.

As we said at the start, pretty much everyone agrees this is a terrible idea.

Left-wing and right-wing civil liberties groups are warning against this.

The NDP and the Conservatives oppose the Bill.

Legal experts and cybersecurity experts say this makes us less safe.

And many of the companies that would have to break their own security systems to comply with the Bill are saying they would never do that - they would rather quit Canada entirely than risk the security of their customers' information, wherever they live.

"But the police need this to catch criminals", say the Liberals.

No.

First, serious criminals already have ways around all of these systems - it's just regular Canadians who will get swept up in this spynet.

Second, the police already have lawful ways to go to a judge and get permission to pursue suspects through the normal manner - in the open, on the record, with accountability mechanisms and protections for innocent Canadians in place.

Giving up our privacy, giving up our security, and giving up our entire legal system is not a fair trade-off for making the police's job slightly easier.

The Liberals need to drop this highly illiberal law now.

Not amend it, not delay it, not study it some more, drop the entire idea, completely.

If you agree, sign our petition to Stop Bill C-22 and then pass it on to every Canadian you know!