Pornography continues to be a public health crisis in Canada, especially for minors. As we’ve documented in our policy report, Canadians consume pornography at some of the highest rates in the world, rewiring the brain of the viewer and exploiting the sexuality of human beings made in God’s image. Although several pieces of legislation were introduced in the last parliament to regulate pornography, none of them passed. 

That’s why we’re thankful that, on June 19, 2025, MP Michelle Rempel Garner introduced Bill C-216, the Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act, which seeks to protect young people online and to combat deepfake pornography. The bill is very similar to MP Rempel Garner’s bill in the previous Parliament, which never proceeded to the debate stage prior to the election.  

Protecting Minors 

The Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act would require social media operators to protect minors online. This would ensure that their personal data is not used in a manner that compromises their privacy and well-being. Operators would be required to prevent or mitigate the effects of online harassment, sexual violence, sexual images of a minor, the promotion of services or products that are illegal for minors, promotion of self-harm, encouraging addiction-like behaviours, and predatory marketing practices. This duty would impact algorithms, advertisements, and personal data. 

The operator would also be required to provide parents of a minor using the platform with safety settings on its platform. These settings would relate to privacy, data deletion, time limits, and preventing purchases and financial transactions. The default setting would be the highest level of protection, but parents could opt-out of certain safety settings. If the user is under 16, the operator must get express consent from a parent for the child to use the platform.  

Bill C-216 would prohibit operators from using personal data to facilitate advertising products that are unlawful for minors and would allow parents to opt out of personalized recommendations based on algorithms. Parents and children would have access to a reporting mechanism to report online harms or risks to minors.  

The operator would be required to have an independent review conducted every two years regarding the platform’s effects on minors. These findings must be made publicly available. Every year, an operator must prepare a report including how many minors visit their site, what systems are in place to protect minors, how many reports of harm it received from users, and how those issues have been addressed. Operators would receive a financial penalty if they contravene the Act.  

Users who claim to have suffered serious harm (or their parents) would be permitted to bring legal action against the operator, something that is not possible now. Serious harm includes physical or psychological harm, substantial damage to reputation or relationships, and substantial economic loss.  

Reporting Child Pornography 

The Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act would also amend Canada’s child pornography legislation to ensure that such content is reported quickly and efficiently. The amendments in Bill C-216 would strengthen those requirements by clarifying the types of Internet services covered and clarifying regulations around the notification process and time periods.   

False Intimate Images 

The third part of the Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act would clarify that the Criminal Code prohibits the sharing of deepfake pornography. These images are edited or altered to falsely depict a person in an intimate way.  

The bill would also increase the maximum criminal penalty for the sharing of non-consensual intimate images to 10 or 14 years in prison in certain circumstances. It would also update the offence of criminal harassment to address the ease and anonymity of harassment online, creating a separate criminal offence for online harassment.  

We’ve written in the past on the importance – and limitations – of governments combatting deepfake pornography. We’ve also written about British Columbia and Manitoba combatting the non-consensual sharing of intimate images. While some provinces have been combatting deepfake porn, the Criminal Code has not been updated to clearly prohibit it. Such an update is critical since artificial intelligence has developed to a point where people can be misrepresented in horrible ways. 

Evaluating the legislation 

Overall, Bill C-216 would place more responsibility on social media companies to protect children online, while also giving parents the tools to manage their child’s online use. While the bill addresses online harm for children, it does so without a new government bureaucracy and without other problematic hate speech elements that have previously been included with child protection legislation.  

The Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act would also give social media users a right to take legal action against social media operators. In addition to potential fines, the threat of legal action incentivizes social media companies to implement better protections for young people online. Rather than requiring the government to police the internet, this legislation requires social media companies to better regulate themselves. 

The bill’s approach to parental oversight of children’s internet use is important. Ensuring that social media companies give parents tools to apply safety settings, privacy settings, and limit their child’s social media use recognizes parents’ primary responsibility and authority to raise their children, and that includes how they manage a child’s internet use. The bill seeks to give parents the tools to adjust safety and privacy settings and choose which settings are most appropriate for their child.  

Follow the progress 

Private members’ bills undergo a long process before they become law and often do not pass. But we are encouraged to see another effort to combat pornography, to better protect young people on the internet, and to recognize the responsibility of parents in managing their children’s online use. We should encourage Members of Parliament to support good policies that combat pornography and are thankful to see another good piece of legislation proposed. Bill C-216 will likely be debated in the House of Commons this fall. Send an EasyMail to your MP asking them to support the bill. For future updates and information about this and other bills that we are following, visit our Legislation to Watch page.