We fight for that

Returning champ Monica Auer visits to preview PIAC and FRPC's online conference, "C-10: The Legal Issues".

Please register for this free webinar on Wednesday, November 3, 2021 from 9:00 am to 4:30 pm ET

More information and registeration are found here:

https://www.piac.ca/2021/10/19/c-10-the-legal-issues/

We discuss the scope and definition of "broadcasting" under the Broadcasting Act and former Bill C-10, which the re-elected minority government has vowed to move through Parliament in the first 100 days post-election.  Also discussed are the limits of CRTC discretion and ability to police the vast new powers delegated to the CRTC to try to control not only traditional broadcasting but now also online platforms such as YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Twitch, Netflix, Crave, Disney+ and Apple+, etc. in Canada.

We eventually consider what makes Canadian content and how one might try to enforce cultural policy on the new platforms.

We invite everyone to listen to the lawyers let loose on this proposed legislation and how to improve it.

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

We explore the Canadian wireless industry's best-kept secret (with CRTC help): their problem with SIM-swap fraud!

Randall Baran-Chong, Co-Founder of Canadian SIM-swap Victims United (CSSVU) joins PIAC to explain his personal experience with fraudsters switching his cell service to a new SIM-card (twice!) and his advocacy for victims before the CRTC, the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology (INDU), in the media and with politicians. John Lawford, PIAC Executive Director and General Counsel, outlines PIAC's ongoing regulatory and other efforts to shed light on the issue, despite regulatory headwinds. Even the politicians know that this is a big deal and one that should be fixed in a transparent way, as INDU's Report on Phone Fraud makes clear - even supporting PIAC's call for a public hearing of the CRTC into SIM-swap.

At the end of the episode, PIAC's Tahira Dawood brings us up to date on airline refunds for COVID-19 cancellations.  Looks like some Westjet customers may be out of luck.

SIM-swap links

Canadian SIM-swap Victims United (CSSVU): search Facebook for this group. You will be asked to show you are a victim of fraud.

Randall Baran-Chong's Brief to INDU Committee: 

https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/431/INDU/Brief/BR10699964/br-external/Baran-ChongRandall-e.pdf

INDU Committee's Report on Phone Fraud (see recommendations 12 and 13 re: SIM-swap fraud:

https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/INDU/report-1/

CRTC's much redacted inquiry into "Fraudulent Wireless Customer Transfers":

https://crtc.gc.ca/otf/eng/2020/8665/c12_202000280.htm

Airlines COVID-19 Refunds - UPDATE

WestJet: Refunds due to COVID-19

Air Transat: Refunds of travel credits issued as a result of COVID-19

Sunwing: Refunds for Vacations cancelled due to COVID-19

Porter Airlines: Claim Your COVID-19 Credit Bonus, or Refund

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

The CRTC's recent reversal of its wholesale internet rates decision will impede small non-profit Internet Service Providers (ISPs) such as Ottawa's community-centred National Capital Freenet (NCF).

Shelley Robinson, NCF's Executive Director, joins PIAC's ED John Lawford to break down the CRTC's increase in rates and how it will impede NCF's desires to offer its "Community Access Fund" and low-cost connectivity at basic service speeds (50 Mbps download / 10 Mbps upload) to its qualifying customers. Shelley also details the pressures the higher rates will place on all non-profit and community-based ISPs  and the CRTC's overconfidence in thinking that its coming "disaggregated" model will rescue small ISPs and better serve customers. Instead, this approach and the higher rates will actually leave a large number of Canadians without internet or relying upon corporate handouts, even if they are solicited by the government (Connecting Families program). This must change to a sustainable model to ensure affordable internet access - based on a model like the U.S. Lifeline program.

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

We discuss the CRTC's disastrous decision on wholesale internet rates from late May 2021 with Andy Kaplan-Myrth, VP Regulatory of Teksavvy, a well-established wholesale-based Internet service provider and its effect on Teksavvy, other wholesale-based ISPs, the market, consumers, the rest of the industry and even the CRTC itself.

We spend a full hour and a half (sorry) to get way into the history and actual details of the rate set by the CRTC - details that usually are not reported on or discussed outside the CRTC - but that will affect the price for Internet access and who delivers it in Canada.  The CRTC's recent decision likely means reduced business investment by smaller providers, some of whom may go out of business, and undoubted headwinds for the business of Teksavvy and others that will stop things like these companies offering wireless service or more rural broadband service.

We discuss Teksavvy's various efforts to continue the fight in a Petition to now overturn this decision and the futility, at some point, of this groundhog day of Internet rate-setting.

We explore the twisted regulatory process and how we arrived at a point where the CRTC could say they were completely right in court, then completely wrong only 2 years later but, despite making many mistakes, it is now not worth their time to fix it properly.  Just, wow. Really? What can consumers do to help break out of this current loop?

CRTC's Wholesale Rate Reversal, here: Telecom Decision CRTC 2021-181

Teksavvy Petition to reverse the reversal, here: TekSavvy Petitions Federal Cabinet to Overrule CRTC’s Arbitrary Rate Decision

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

Consumers in Canada are now eligible for refunds for flights cancelled due to COVID-19 from two airlines and more are likely to be added soon.  Our guest this episode is Tahira Dawood, PIAC's second articling student and former researcher at PIAC (and she is also a foreign-qualified lawyer and worked in the aviation industry!). We break down the airline bailouts at Air Canada and Air Transat, and what consumers must do and by when to get their money back and how to apply for these refunds and other details.

We also cannot help ourselves as we talk about the challenges for consumers of passenger air travel in the best of times, and now in the worst of times. We also discuss possible bailouts (and refunds!?!) for travellers on other Canadian airlines such as WestJet, Sunwing, Porter, etc.

We talk about the problem of prepayment for flights that cannot fly and why consumers usually do not get refunds.  However, this episode really celebrates the power of consumers to get fair treatment when they band together and use their collective power to ask for a clear remedy like a refund.  Way to go Canadian consumers! You are getting your money back. Enjoy this rare event - but don't delay or you might miss it.

Important links:

Air Canada Refund information (from Air Canada - see link below for refund page):

"Air Canada is extending a refund option to all eligible customers with tickets for travel dates on or after February 1, 2020 and who purchased their ticket before April 13, 2021. Refunds are available to those customers whose flight was cancelled or who voluntarily cancelled their flight for any reason, and who wish to submit a request for a refund to their original form of payment. Customers can request a refund online at www.aircanada.com/refund until June 12, 2021. The policy also applies to Air Canada Vacations packages.

Customers who booked through a travel agency must contact their agent directly. In support of its travel agency partners, Air Canada confirmed today that it will not recall agency sales commissions on refunded tickets that they process."

Air Transat Refund Information: https://www.airtransat.com/en-CA/refunds

You must submit your request using the online form by August 26, 2021, 11:59 p.m.

If you experience difficulty with refunds, you may be able to complain to the Canadian Transportation Agency, which has an information page for those who made CTA complaints prior to the bailout refunds being announced. Consumers should check with CTA on their complaint.  See: How the CTA will be processing Air Canada and Air Transat refund-related complaints resulting from the pandemic

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

Will the CRTC's recent decision on mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) provide new wireless competition in Canada? We discuss this in excruciating detail with Ben Klass, PhD Candidate and telecom policy wunderkind. The answer: not likely, sorry.  This likely result leads the conversation to frustrations with Canadian telecom regulation of competition, including wholesale rates that end up affecting how many competitors consumers have to choose from and how much they charge for cellphone service as well as telecom mergers, such as Rogers buying Shaw, which appear to be a way for industry to avoid regulation.  This leads us to consider how much public interest should be in telecommunications and how to get more for consumers.  Retail rate regulation? Structural separation? Political action?  All are on the table. There may be some hope for consumers needing low-cost wireless services, however, as the MVNO decision requires the Big 3 to offer affordable cellphone plans.  We shall see.

Ben mentions two books in the podcast.  Find them here:

Mariana Mazzucato, The Entrepreneurial State 

https://marianamazzucato.com/books/the-entrepreneurial-state

and

Rob MacDougall, The People's Network

https://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/15154.html

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

John Lawford, PIAC's Executive Director and General Counsel welcomes special guest Konrad von Finckenstein, PIAC's current Chair of the Board, to work through options the Competition Bureau, the CRTC and the Industry Minister could have to modify the deal to preserve at least some competition.  In a spirited conversation, Mr. Lawford attempts to outline consumer frustration with the process and the deal, while Mr. von Finckenstein calmly discusses the cold, hard calculations in the regulatory, merger and political fields and how they could play out in a frankly challenging merger with no easy way to ensure the same level of competition before and after. He should know: he has been Commissioner of Competition,  Chair of the CRTC,  advisor on mergers to the Industry Minister,  Federal Court of Appeal justice and much more. But that doesn't stop Mr. Lawford from trying. Both agreed, however, that the CRTC's upcoming MVNO decision, expected the very next day, would change the context and maybe the entire conversation.

We hope that this lively exchange of views will help consumers understand the complexities of mergers in Canada and that their voice is needed.

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

John Lawford, PIAC's Executive Director and General Counsel, explains merger review in Canada in light of the proposed Rogers-Shaw merger. What fun.

Competition law basics are described but the real process of applying them to a deal by the Competition Bureau and the parties is covered, along with the roles of the CRTC and the Minister of Innovation Science and Industry in the Department of Industry, Science and Economic Development (ISED).

This convoluted process has previously resulted in blocking 0 of 6 previous wireless mergers.  What do you think are the odds of stopping number 7?

Consumers can have an effect and should express their views to all of these government bodies. PIAC will be as well, but the only real voice belongs to the consumers who buy and use wireless, Internet and other services of these large telecommunications companies.  Have your say!

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

PIAC's articling student, Yuka Sai, joins John Lawford to discuss the epic battle between business, with an assist from the federal government, and consumers over privacy.

This battle centres on Bill C-11 and in particular, the part called the "Consumer Privacy Protection Act".

This doublespeak title hides the facts that the bill will amend our present Canadian private sector privacy act, the Personal Information and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), to allow collection and use of your personal information for any "business purpose" without your consent.  This is a reversal of the law that, what, they thought we would just not notice? Seriously? Also discussed is the issue of anonymization of data, the difference of that concept with pseudonymization, and why Bill C-11 totally fails by mixing up these two concepts under the umbrella of "de-identified" data.  Guess what, under Bill C-11, "de-identified" data, whatever that is, can be used indiscriminately by business and can be shared with a third party, provided it is shared with a government-related institution for a "socially beneficial purpose".  What is a socially beneficial purpose? It's what the government defines it as. Nice.

What's being done with all of this data that everyone seems to want? It's going into artificial intelligence (AI). Algorithms will be used on this massive amount of data, so that AI, not humans, can make decisions that affect you as a consumer, like, will you get an insurance policy and how much will your policy cost (if it lets you get one)? Under Bill C-11, a business will tell you if they are making decisions about you based on AI, but only if you ask. What if you object and want a human decision? Too bad. There's no constitutional right to privacy in Canada, unlike in Europe.  Is it time to change that?

So, we stand on the precipice of losing consumer privacy rights in Canada.  Do you care? If so, please listen and join us in taking on the fight to defeat Bill C-11. Shame on them.

Lastly, for "told you so", we discuss the dismissal of the Internet wholesale rate application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. Now the CRTC has to reconsider the rates. Wait for it. Again.

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/

The CanCon is coming! The CanCon is coming! Or not.  Today we discuss Bill C-10, An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts, phew!

Today's guest Monica Auer, Executive Director of Canada’s Forum for Research and Policy in Communications (FRPC) strives mightily to explain broadcasting regulation in Canada and how the federal government wants to change it.  What could go wrong? Turns out a lot, if you hurry to do it, have a very specific goal in mind but ignore the rest, and just rip the heart out of it. Surgery or a roadmap? You decide.

Also, we talk about hard questions to communications service providers about moving people against their will to paper billing  and why the FRPC told the CRTC months ago that CBC's Tandem service was an abominable snowman.  Told you so.

Find Canada’s Forum for Research and Policy in Communications (FRPC) at: https://www.frpc.net

Happy holidays!

Make a donation to PIAC, right now, through Canada Helps: https://www.piac.ca/become-a-donor/