Bill C-22 Is a Mess of the Government's Own Making | Hacker News Reader

Bill C-22 Is a Mess of the Government's Own Making

ethanplant.ca

17 pointsethanplant4 comments

The RCMP confirmed yesterday in a Canadian parliament SECU Committee meeting that Bill C-22 is meant to give them encryption backdoors.

* Source: https://www.michaelgeist.ca/2026/05/rcmp-confirms-bill-c-22-...

Various groups have posted tools that you can use to message your MPs, including the Internet Society.

* The Internet Society's tool: https://www.internetsociety.org/our-work/internet-policy/kee...

* OpenMedia's messaging tool: https://action.openmedia.org/page/188754/action/1

* ICLM's messaging tool: https://iclmg.ca/stop-c-22/

There is also an official House of Commons e-petition: https://www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en/Petition/Details?Peti...

This legislation was tabled by Minister of Public Safety of Canada (Gary Anandasangaree: gary.anand@parl.gc.ca) and has the support of the Minister of Justice (Sean Fraser: sean.fraser@parl.gc.ca). The Canadian Prime Minister (Mark Carney: mark.carney@parl.gc.ca) is also obviously involved in pushing this.

* The SECU Committee members and their meetings on C-22 can be found here: https://www.ourcommons.ca/Committees/en/SECU

The Minister of Public Safety has indicated that he wants to rush this legislation into law before June 19, which is when Canadian parliament goes into recess for the summer.

* Source: https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/public-safety-ministe...

I wonder how this will impact OpenBSD if the bill is passed ? OpenBSD is based in Canada due to old encryption laws in the US.

The legislation intentionally defines "electronic service" extremely vaguely so that it can apply to almost anything software and technology related:

> electronic service means a service, or a feature of a service, that involves the creation, recording, storage, processing, transmission, reception, emission or making available of information in electronic, digital or any other intangible form by an electronic, digital, magnetic, optical, biometric, acoustic or other technological means, or a combination of any such means. (service électronique)

The legislation allows for any electronic service to be subject to the same rules as telecom companies for metadata retention and lawful access.

* https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/45-1/bill/C-22/first-r...

I’d be cautious about saying OpenBSD itself is directly affected. It really depends on if OpenBSD counts as an “electronic service provider”.

You do raise a pretty good point though, Canada has long benefited from being perceived as a relatively trustworthy jurisdiction. So even if OpenBSD themselves are out of scope, there is a negative reputational hit that will impact Canadian tech.

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