OTTAWA—Sen. Julie Miville-Dechêne of Québec reintroduced her national age verification law on Thursday with the intent of requiring all residents of Canada to verify their ages before viewing pornographic material on the internet.
Bill S-209 is Sen. Miville-Dechêne's latest attempt at the effort of implementing age verification, which stalled in Parliament last year. Now, she intends to push through the controversial legislation with the support of new Prime Minister Mark Carney of the governing Liberal Party.
Miville-Dechêne is a member of the center-left party Bloc Québécois and has the support of the Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party.
S-209 is titled the "Protecting Young Persons From Exposure to Pornography Act" and outlines a framework for requiring the deployment of "reasonable" age verification and assurance measures to prevent minors from viewing age-restricted materials while in Canada's national digital space.
Companies that would be directly impacted include Aylo, the Québec-based parent company of Pornhub.com. According to the introduced text of the bill, adult platforms that do not comply with the age verification provisions of S-209 would be subject to costly fines.
Speaking to The Globe and Mail newspaper, a spokesperson for Aylo, sticking to form, advocated for device-based age verification instead of site-level verification measures.
The spokesperson, Alex Kekesi, Aylo's head of community and brand, told the newspaper that Aylo is “fully committed to ensuring the safety of minors online" and that its platforms, including Pornhub, are “strictly reserved for those of legal age only.”
The Globe and Mail report additionally notes an investigation into Aylo's compliance with age verification laws recently announced by the European Union.
With regards to the new Canadian bill, a first violation would be subject to a fine of up to $250,000, and at least $500,000 for violations that follow.
The text of the bill also reveals that it would require Canada's internet service providers (ISPs), like Bell Canada or Rogers, to block adult platforms that are in violation of the law or are under enforcement action and a federal court order to block the platform.
"Federal Court must order any respondent Internet service providers to prevent access to the pornographic material by young persons on the Internet in Canada," if the ISP or the pornography website violates the provisions of the law, the bill text notes.
"It’s more than time for Canada to act to protect children from the serious harms of exposure to pornography online," said Sen. Miville-Dechêne via The Globe and Mail report.
If the bill is adopted, it would enter into force one year after it is granted royal assent by the Governor General of Canada. The Governor General of Canada, currently Mary Simon, serves as King Charles III's representative to the country, as Canada still falls under the Commonwealth of the former British Empire.
Canada still recognizes the monarch of the United Kingdom as the monarch of Canada.
