Indigenous data sovereignty takes centre stage at connectivity summit

OTTAWA—Indigenous nations across North America were encouraged to assert ownership and control over their digital infrastructure during a panel discussion at this year’s Indigenous Connectivity Summit. The ninth iteration of the annual summit was originally scheduled to take place this May in the Lummi Nation, located in the U.S. state of Washington, before it was moved to Canada due to safety concerns. A core discussion on day one of the rescheduled event focused on the rising wave of data centre construction and its impact on Indigenous data sovereignty. Moderated by Asennaienton Frank Horn, director of workforce development for the Indigenous Connectivity Institute, the panel featured community leaders that already have their own data centres, alongside experts emphasizing caution and informed decision-making. One component of the discussion was a case study from Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory in northeastern Ontario, where the community established its own data centre earlier this summer. Michael McCormick, chief technology officer for the community, explained that the motivation for the project was the ownership and accessibility of information. He lamented the ongoing need to “almost beg for it” and “get into wrestling matches” with different entities for access to the community’s data. Having their own data centre will act as a “shield” for their technology, ensuring the community maintains control and that external entities are also being “good stewards” of their data. The primary expected benefit of the data centre is for it to serve as a central repository to safely store data and preserve cultural information for future generations. Beyond culture, the project has provided tangible economic benefits by requiring the development of a large IT team, said McCormick. Wiikwemkoong is also actively recruiting and training employees as it prepares to bring the data centre online. A unique aspect of Wiikwemkoong’s technological infrastructure is the planned integration of the data centre with the community’s extensive safety systems, including about 20 drones and 700 surveillance cameras. Sharayah Lane, senior advisor for community connectivity at the Internet Society, joined the panel virtually from the Lummi Nation and emphasized that while the opportunities presented by data centres are exciting, Indigenous communities are currently dealing with a “gold rush” environment when it comes to AI and its infrastructure. “There's a real pressure on tribal nations to move quickly on understanding, planning, developing data centers,” said Lane. She noted one instance of a community that had been approached by three different investors looking for a deal to get a data centre built on their land. Lane stressed the importance of taking time to understand the “full context” of data centre development, highlighting environmental concerns around their use of water and energy. She pushed back against the pressure to move quickly, arguing that decisions must be made “in a good way and in a way that’s best for our people.” Skylee-Storm Hogan-Stacey, senior research officer for the First Nations Information Governance Centre’s (FNIGC) Data Sovereignty Research Collaborative, echoed that communities must be armed with enough knowledge to make informed decisions. Hogan-Stacey highlighted that data ownership, control, access, and possession — the First Nations Principles of OCAP — can be enacted differently depending on a community’s specific situation. Having a data centre in a community’s own territory does not automatically ensure sovereignty; protection of that data must also be prioritized.The FNIGC’s work focuses on how communities identify and protect valuable cultural, linguistic, and safety data, she noted. “Connectivity is one thing, and having that infrastructure is one thing, but it's what we decide to datafy, and digitize, and how we use that, how we protect it, that is a completely other part of that equation that I think is important for respecting and confirming those principles of OCAP,” said Hogan-Stacey. Environmental concerns were also addressed, though McCormick pointed out that Wiikwemkoong's small-scale data centre currently faces the opposite challenge of the large-scale centres often protested in non-Indigenous communities; their main concern is keeping it warm during the -40C winter months, rather than managing cooling and water usage. Hogan-Stacey cautioned that “First Nations need to be aware in Canada that we're living in territories that have always been eyed for development, always been eyed for extraction, and for what benefits that they could offer non-Indigenous people.” Larger, external data centre proposals must be evaluated critically, she said, as the benefits may not outweigh the costs. “There might be some jobs created, sure,” but depending on the size of the data centre, “you'd be amazed at how few people they need to run these giant, giant places,” she continued. Indigenous communities also need to be mindful of external legislative risks, said Hogan-Stacey, such as the U.S. Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data (CLOUD) Act, which could compromise their independence if data passes through U.S. channels. A data centre is “a tool that has a cost, and we have to be very cognizant of how we're using it and what we're using it for,” she stated. phalentm@thewirereport.ca

Indigenous data sovereignty takes centre stage at connectivity summit

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By Phalen Tynes-MacDonald
|September 22, 2025

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