Harms Reduction: A Six-Step Program

Executive Summary

Following nine months of study and deliberations, the Canadian Commission on Democratic Expression settled on a series of principles and recommendations meant to lead to a practical course of action, offering functional steps to enable citizens, governments and platforms to deal with harmful speech in a free and democratic, rights-based society like Canada.

The Commission's principles hold that free speech is fundamental to democracy and that the internet enables more people to participate in public debate, but that the rise of hatred, disinformation, conspiracies, bullying and other harmful communications online is undermining these gains. Leaving content moderation to the sole discretion of platforms has failed to stem these harms, and platforms are not neutral disseminators of information but curate content to serve their commercial interests, so must assume greater responsibility for the harms they amplify. Government must play a more active role in protecting Canadians from online harms, and any policy response must put citizens first, reduce online harms, and guard against over-censorship through a balanced, multi-pronged approach.

These principles led the Commission to an integrated program of six recommendations: a new legislated Duty to Act Responsibly imposing an affirmative requirement on platforms, social media companies, large messaging groups, search engines and other internet operators; a new regulatory body to oversee and enforce this duty and a Code of Conduct, with judicially made decisions subject to review; a Social Media Council providing an inclusive forum for platforms, civil society, citizens and others on platform governance and content moderation; a world-leading transparency regime covering data, ads, bots and the right to compel information, to serve the regulator, the Social Media Council, researchers, journalists and the public; an e-tribunal and related processes to enable individuals and groups to expeditiously resolve complaints of harmful content and compel platforms to notify creators of complaints; and a quick-response mechanism, under the regulator's authority, to rapidly remove content that presents an imminent threat to a person's health and safety.

The Commission considered but declined to impose fixed-window takedown requirements, such as a 24-hour removal window with penalties, as some nations have done, out of concern such systems create incentives for over-censorship. It deliberately left the standards of the Duty to Act Responsibly loosely defined at this stage, to be developed by government, the regulator and the Social Media Council through a Code of Conduct, and clarified that it is not recommending a new self-standing tort but rather affirmative requirements on platforms developed under legislation and regulation.