John Carpay:
Having governments spy on citizens is a great way to reduce crime! Consider how many more criminals would have been caught over the past century if only police had been able to listen in on citizens’ telephone conversations.
Why do Canadians – and citizens of other democracies around the world – cherish privacy in the first place? If a man has nothing to hide, why would he care if the authorities read his mail, texts, and emails? Why does Charter section 8 expressly set out the right of Canadians to be free from unreasonable search and seizure?
Privacy is essential for freedom. An innocent person who has nothing to hide still values the freedom to do and say things, and meet with people, without the state silently observing her every move. People prefer privacy in their backyards, for example, over a nosy neighbour. If we’re not OK with one of our neighbours (or even a close friend) knowing everything about us, why would we be OK with police or other agents of the state to obtain this information?
The horrific February 2026 mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., has generated calls for more state surveillance over the lives of Canadians, especially in regard to Artificial Intelligence (AI). Some call for greater government regulation or even nationalization of AI companies. While the desire to prevent future tragedies is understandable, such measures risk seriously damaging Canadians’ privacy, autonomy, and freedom of expression.
Another reason to reject state surveillance is that human nature is a mixture of good and evil. Governments are made up of people. People can do great and wonderful things as well as evil things. More citizens were murdered by their own governments in the 20th century than the number of soldiers who died on the battlefields. From Stalin and Mao to Hitler and Pol Pot, state surveillance was a key tool used to enforce obedience, crush dissent, maintain power, and perpetrate genocides. Privacy is the shield of a free people.
Therefore, in free societies like Canada, police must go to court to obtain a warrant before conducting ongoing surveillance of a person’s communications. This system of requiring a warrant allows authorities to target genuine threats while protecting the privacy and property rights of the vast majority of citizens who pose no danger to others. For centuries, Canada’s warrant-based approach has struck the right balance.
The Tumbler Ridge shooting does not justify placing Canadians’ private AI interactions under state surveillance and control. Eight months before the attack, the shooter had used OpenAI’s ChatGPT to explore ideas involving gun violence. OpenAI banned the user but did not contact police, seeing no imminent danger. The police had seized the shooter’s firearms in 2024, but police (not AI) returned the guns to the shooter one month before the shooting.
Giving new surveillance powers to government is not a solution for murder. Rather, the roots of violence lie in deeper cultural and societal problems: family breakdown, fatherless homes, loneliness, declining mental health, and a loss of respect for human life. Mass surveillance of AI conversations does not address these root causes.
This brings us to Bill C-22, the Lawful Access Act. Under the pretext of “public safety,” Bill C-22 would expand the federal government’s surveillance powers, and likely capture AI companies like OpenAI under its broad definition of “electronic service provider.” This could require these AI companies, along with other “core providers” like Rogers, Bell, Google and WhatsApp, to name only a few, to retain metadata for up to one year and build systems for rapid data handover when law enforcement presents a valid authorization.
To this end, Bill C-22 also lowers the threshold for obtaining judicial approval for law enforcement to demand users’ subscriber information (name, address, email, IP address, account details, etc.) from “reasonable grounds to believe” to “reasonable grounds to suspect.”
Professor Michael Geist posits that mandatory metadata retention for internet service providers is one of the most privacy-invasive tools available, creating backdoor surveillance capabilities extending beyond the government’s stated anti-crime goals.
No matter how important public safety or technological progress may be, we would be foolish to surrender our fundamental freedoms, starting with the essential right to privacy.
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