Submission to the Standing Senate Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs on Bill C-8, An Act respecting cyber security, amending the Telecommunications Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts

The Honourable Marty Deacon, Senator
Chair, Standing Senate Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs
The Senate of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario  K1A 0A4

RE: Submission on Bill C-8, An Act respecting cyber security, amending the Telecommunications Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts

Thank you for the opportunity to provide my views to the Standing Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs (“the Committee”) on Bill C-8, an important legislative initiative that seeks to promote cyber security in Canada’s critical infrastructure. In this submission, I acknowledge some of the significant improvements that Parliament has made to the Bill. I then propose two additional recommendations for the Committee’s consideration, both of which I have advocated for in the past, most recently in a November 2025 submission on Bill C-8 to the Standing House Committee on Public Safety and National Security. In my view, these proposals would further promote and protect privacy rights without undermining the important cyber security-related objectives of this Bill.

In my appearance before the Committee on the former Bill C-26 (the predecessor to Bill C-8) on November 18, 2024, I observed that Parliament had made several privacy-protective amendments to that bill. I am pleased to see that these amendments were carried over to Bill C-8, and, furthermore, that the following additional privacy-protective amendments have been made since its introduction: