Backgrounder – Government of Canada announces expert advisory group on online safety

OTTAWA, March 30, 2022

Following the release of What We Heard: The Government’s proposed approach to address harmful content online on February 3, 2022, the Government of Canada is now unveiling the next step in its work to design legislation to address harmful content online by announcing the composition of its expert advisory group on online safety.

This expert advisory group has been given a mandate to provide the Minister of Canadian Heritage with advice on how best to design the legislative and regulatory framework to address harmful content online, and how to best incorporate the feedback received during the national consultation the government held last year.

More specifically, the expert advisory group will participate in nine workshops on the components of a legislative and regulatory framework for online safety, including an introductory workshop and a workshop summarizing the substantive sessions. The sessions will address the following core components of the framework:  

• Setting out which online services should be regulated, and to what extent
• Establishing how “harmful content” would be defined and regulated
• Identifying a set of obligations and requirements for regulated entities to monitor, moderate and manage harmful content on their services
• Setting an enforcement toolkit to help promote and ensure compliance
• Laying out reasonable linkages to authorities
• Identifying programming and policy responses that could be included in the framework to confront disinformation and build civic and media literacy and resilience
• Ensuring the inclusion of elements that protect freedom of expression and privacy rights

The expert advisory group is composed of twelve experts and specialists from across Canada who will provide expert knowledge in a variety of fields. They come from diverse backgrounds with experience on issues relating to platform governance and content regulation, civil liberties, tech regulation, and national security. The group will be led by two co-chairs, Pierre Trudel and Emily Laidlaw, who will help facilitate discussion and communication throughout the consultation. Members of the expert advisory group will receive remuneration for their services.

The selected experts forming the group and their biographies are as follows:

Amarnath Amarasingam, Assistant Professor

School Of Religion, Queen’s University

Amarnath Amarasingam is an Assistant Professor in the School of Religion and is cross-appointed to the Department of Political Studies at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He is also a Senior Fellow with the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation.

His research is focused on terrorism and political violence; sociology of religion; religion and violence; social movements; religion and politics in the Middle East; religion and the public sphere; diaspora politics and activism; religion and media/social media; atheism and non-religion; hate movements and the far-right.

Mr. Amarasingam is the author of Pain, Pride, and Politics: Sri Lankan Tamil Activism in Canada (2015), and the co-editor of Sri Lanka: The Struggle for Peace in the Aftermath of War (2016). He has also published over 40 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, has presented papers at over 100 national and international conferences, and has written for The New York Times, The Monkey Case, The Washington Post, CNN, Politico, The Atlantic, and Foreign Affairs. He has been interviewed on CNN, PBS Newshour, CBC, BBC, and a variety of other media outlets.

Bernie Farber, Chair

Anti-Hate Network

Bernie Farber is the Chair of the Anti-hate Network. He is acknowledged as one of Canada’s most accomplished NGO CEOs. His career spans more than 30 years focused on human rights, diversity, anti-racism, and extremism. His efforts have been documented in numerous Canadian Human Rights publications, books, newspapers and magazines. His work has also been cited for its expertise in a number of academic publications.

Mr. Farber has successfully run large NGOs and Foundations such as the Canadian Jewish Congress, the Paloma Foundation, and retired as the Executive Director of the Mosaic Institute.

Mr. Farber is a human rights consultant, newspaper columnist and social justice advocate. He has received numerous awards for his civil rights work, including the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee medal, Government of Canada 125 Commemorative medal, the Chancellor's Commendation of the Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John and the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police Award for Outstanding Service and Dedication to Policing in the province of Ontario, among others.

Chanae Parsons, Specialist

Community Activist and Youth Engagement

Chanae Parsons comes from the historical Black Heritage community of Lucasville and is a loving mother to her son Cairo. She is a strong professional with a Bachelor of Social Work degree from Dalhousie University and pursuing a Master of Education focused in Adult Education, Women's Leadership and Community Development from St. Francis Xavier University. In her official role as the Manager of Programming and Community Engagement for the Eastern District of the Halifax Public Libraries, the largest public library system in the Province, Chanae oversees the development and implementation of programming and community engagement strategy for one of four regions of the Halifax municipality, as well as Youth Services across all branches.

Ms. Parsons participates on several Nova Scotian leadership committees, such as the African Nova Scotian Sexual Violence Advisory Committee, formed by the Department of Community Services to create the e-learning module: African Nova Scotian Perspectives on Sexual Violence, and the African Nova Scotian Employment Innovation Lab, also formed by the Department of Community Services to find innovative solutions to help lower the unemployment rates amongst Black youth in Nova Scotia. She also sits on the Board of Directors for Black Girls Gather and GameChangers902. Additionally, she is co-founder of the community-based organization ACCE HFX (Arts, Community, Culture, and Economics), where she provides support, resources, and learning opportunities to a wide range of African Nova Scotians in vulnerable positions.

Ms. Parsons is both passionate and experienced in youth leadership, program creation and facilitation, research, project management, policy reform, critical thinking, public speaking, as well as diversity and inclusion. She prioritizes youth-led initiatives and is committed to ensuring that youth, specifically Black youth, see themselves reflected in leadership roles.

David Morin, Professor

Faculty Of Arts and Humanities, Université De Sherbrooke

David Morin is a full professor at the School of Applied Politics of the Université de Sherbrooke. His areas of expertise and professional experience focus on national and international security issues. Since 2017, he has been a co-holder of the UNESCO Chair in the Prevention of Violent Radicalization and Extremism (UNESCO-PREV Chair) and in 2015 co-founded the Observatory on Radicalization and Violent Extremism (OSR). He is also a manager of the PREV-IMPACT Canada program on the evaluation of violent extremism prevention programs, funded by Public Safety Canada’s Community Resilience Fund. Mr. Morin is an active contributor to the debate and dialogue on these issues in the Canadian context and leads numerous scientific and public activities.

He is currently Co-President of the Dialogue+ project, which aims to prevent discrimination and radicalization in Canada, and was one of the initiators of the Youth Forum – Thinking Democracy Differently, a Quebec program aimed at combatting and defusing extremist discourse leading to violence. He sits as a designated expert on the steering committee of the Francophone Network for the Prevention of Violent Radicalization and Extremism that could lead to Terrorism (FrancoPREV) of the International Organization of La Francophonie and was a member of the scientific committee for the UNESCO Internet and the Radicalization of Youth conference in 2016.

Mr. Morin also has a rich and diverse experience in coordinating international projects with researchers and practitioners and in capacity building in Francophone Africa. He has just co-edited the book Le nouvel âge des extrêmes? Les démocraties occidentales, la radicalisation et l’extrémisme violent, published in 2021 by the Presses de l’Université de Montréal. He has also co-authored a number of recent reports on the evaluation of violent extremism prevention, on prevention mechanisms in the Francophone space, and on conspiracy and misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emily Laidlaw, Associate Professor

Faculty of Law, University Of Calgary

Emily Laidlaw is a Canada Research Chair in Cybersecurity Law and Associate Professor at the University of Calgary in the Faculty of Law. She researches in the area of technology regulation and human rights, with a focus on content regulation, platform liability, privacy and freedom of expression. She is the author of the book Regulating Speech in Cyberspace: Gatekeepers, Human Rights and Corporate Responsibility (Cambridge University Press, 2015). As a scholar, she actively contributes to law reform, with recent projects on defamation, non-consensual disclosure of intimate images, the tort of privacy and online abuse, and platform governance.

Ms. Laidlaw has taught a variety of courses over the years in Internet Law, Privacy and Cybersecurity, Media Law, Human Rights, Tort Law, Intellectual Property, and Foundations of Law and Justice. She is also the Ethics Advisor to the Members of Council at the City of Calgary and previously practiced as a litigator. From 2006 to 2014, Ms. Laidlaw obtained her LLM and PhD from the London School of Economics and Political Science and was an Assistant Professor (lecturer) at the University of East Anglia Law School.

Ms. Laidlaw is a network director of the Canadian Network on Information Security and a member of the Institute for Security, Privacy and Information Assurance.

Ghayda Hassan, Professor

Université du Québec À Montréal

Ghayda Hassan, a clinical psychologist and professor of clinical psychology at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), is the founder and director of the Canada Practitioners Network for the Prevention of Radicalization and Extremist Violence (CPN-PREV). She is also a researcher with the Research and Action on Social Polarization (RAPS) team of the SHERPA University Institute at the Integrated Health and Social Services University Network for West-Central Montreal. She also acts as a policy consultant on violence intervention (radicalization, domestic violence and war) and is a member of the RCMP Interim Management Advisory Board.

She contributes her expertise to several national and international partnerships in research, clinical practice and community intervention. Her systematic reviews, research and clinical activities focus on four main areas: social suffering, relationships between communities, and violent extremism; intervention in the context of armed conflict and domestic violence; identity, belonging and mental health of children and adolescents who are members of ethnic or religious minority groups; and intervention and cultural sensitivity training of various professionals working with vulnerable immigrants and refugees.

Heidi Tworek, Associate Professor

School Of Public Policy And Global Affairs And History, University Of British Columbia

Heidi Tworek is a Canada Research Chair and Associate Professor of international history and public policy at the University of British Columbia. She is an award-winning researcher of media, history, health communications, international organizations and platform governance. She is also a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation. She is also a non-resident fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

Ms. Tworek received her BA (Hons) in Modern and Medieval Languages from Cambridge University and earned her PhD in History from Harvard University.

Ms. Tworek has advised officials and policymakers from multiple European and North American governments on media, democracy and the digital economy. She previously held the position of Assistant Director of Undergraduate Studies and lecturer in History at Harvard University.

Lianna Mcdonald, Executive Director

Canadian Centre for Child Protection

Lianna McDonald is the executive director of the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. Since 1998, she has guided the agency from its grass roots origins to a leading organization on the international stage in the fight against child victimization.

Ms. McDonald spearheaded the creation of Project Arachnid, the world’s leading technology for disrupting the online distribution of child sexual abuse material globally. To date, more than six million images targeted by Project Arachnid have been removed from the internet. She works closely with international partners, including survivor organizations, child protection NGOs and law enforcement agencies. Her expertise in this space is frequently called upon by key groups including the Five Country Ministerial’s child exploitation task force, the United Kingdom’s Home Office as well as European Union officials.

In Canada, Ms. McDonald oversaw the establishment of Cybertip.ca, which later became the national tipline under the Government of Canada’s National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet. Her advocacy efforts with provincial and federal governments have contributed to multiple legislative changes for the protection of children, including the creation of the criminal code offenses related to online child luring and legislation for the mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse material by internet service providers.

Ms. McDonald is the recipient of the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal (2002) and the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal (2012) for her continued dedication to the safety of children.

Pierre Trudel, Professor

Faculty of Law, Université De Montréal

Pierre Trudel is a full professor at the Centre de recherche en droit public of the Université de Montréal’s Faculty of Law. He is a member of the Royal Society of Canada. He teaches civil law, intellectual property law, information law and cyberspace law.

From 1990 to 1995, he was director of the Université de Montréal’s Centre de recherche en droit public. From 2003 to 2015, he was the holder of the L.R. Wilson Chair in Information Technology and E-Commerce Law.

Mr. Trudel was a member of the expert panel for the review of Canada’s communications laws from 2018 to 2020. He is the author or co-author of several books, including Droit du cyberespace (1997), Introduction à la loi sur le cadre juridique des technologies de l’information (2012) and Les fausses nouvelles nouveaux visages, nouveaux défis (2018).

Mr. Trudel is currently working on research projects on fundamental information rights, privacy protection in public service networks, assessment of legal issues and risks, the Internet of Things, e-health, audiovisual law, e-commerce and methodologies for developing rules of conduct in Internet environments.

Signa A. Daum Shanks, Associate Professor

Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa

Signa A. Daum Shanks is a trained lawyer, law professor, and historian. Most recently, she was an Associate Professor at York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School. Her teaching has included classes such as Torts, Law and economics, Aboriginal Self-government, Canadian legal History, the Kawashimhon Aboriginal Rights Moot, Game Theory and the Law, Indigenous Peoples and Canadian Law, and Comparative Indigenous Legal Traditions and Indigenous Peoples. She previously taught at the University of Saskatchewan’s College of Law, the summer program hosted at the Indigenous Law Centre in Saskatoon and the Nunavut Law Program in Iqaluit.

Ms. Daum Shanks has also worked for Justice Canada, Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, and Saskatchewan Justice, as well as the Toronto office of a national law firm and the criminal appeals division of the Ministry of the Attorney General of Ontario.

Her current research interest revolves around law and economics, Indigenous Governance, and legal history. She has received recognition and funding for her impactful research and professional accomplishments.

Taylor Owen, Beaverbrook Chair

Media, Ethics and Communications

Taylor Owen is the Beaverbrook Chair in Media, Ethics and Communications, the founding Director of the Center Media, Technology and Democracy, and an Associate Professor in the Max Bell School of Public Policy at McGill University. Mr. Owen is also a senior fellow at the Center for International Governance Innovation (CIGI).

He is the Co-Chair of the Canadian Commission on Democratic Expression with former Supreme Court Justice Beverley McLaughlin. He was previously an Assistant Professor of Digital Media and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia and the Research Director of Tow Center for Digital Journalism at the Columbia School of Journalism.

Mr. Owen has a doctorate from the University of Oxford and his work focuses on the intersection of digital media, technology, and public policy. His main research projects at the moment include work developing and studying domestic and international platform governance policies, a large-scale digital ecosystem monitoring project called the Media Ecosystem Observatory, work on understanding the impact of digital technologies on childhood development, and comparative analysis of government journalism support policies around the world.

He has been a Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar, a Banting Postdoctoral Fellow, an Action Canada and Public Policy Forum Fellow, the 2016 Public Policy Forum Emerging Leader and, until 2019, served on CIGI’s Board of Directors and the Governing Council of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).

Vivek Krishnamurthy, Samuelson-Glushko Professor of Law

University Of Ottawa

Vivek Krishnamurthy is the Samuelson-Glushko Professor of Law at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC).

Mr. Krishnamurthy’s teaching, scholarship, and clinical legal practice focus on the complex regulatory and human rights-related challenges that arise in cyberspace. He advises governments, activists, and companies on the human rights impacts of new technologies and is a frequent public commentator on emerging technology and public policy issues.

Mr. Krishnamurthy is currently a Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, a Faculty Associate of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, and a Senior Associate of the Human Rights Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.