TAGGED AS COVID-19
CRTC rejects Stingray COVID relief request, orders broadcaster to pay $9M in tangible benefits
telecom | 08/16/2022 5:05 pm EDT
The CRTC has denied an application from Stingray Group Inc. for relief from payments the company owes to the broadcasting sector known as "tangible benefits payments," to the...
Government, Telefilm, extend support for uninsured Canadian productions
Media | 02/11/2022 1:06 pm EST
The Government of Canada has extended its temporary emergency fund addressing the lack of insurance coverage in the Canadian film and television production industry....
CRTC sides with creative sector in broadcasters’ CanCon relief proposal
Media | 08/12/2021 5:23 pm EDT
The CRTC has denied a request made by the Canadian Association of...
CRTC reports drop in broadcast revenue for 2020
Media | 07/16/2021 5:38 pm EDT
With advertising revenues battered by the pandemic -- particularly the second half of the year -- the...
PIAC calls for $50 internet subsidy for lower-income Canadians during pandemic
telecom | 01/14/2021 4:12 pm EST
Canada should follow the lead of the United States and put in place a $50 “broadband benefit” throughout the rest of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) says. The...
Corus revenues down 10 per cent
Media | 01/12/2021 6:58 pm EST
Corus Entertainment Inc. reported Tuesday its first-quarter revenues were $420.3 million, down 10 per cent from the same period a year earlier. Profits, meanwhile, were down three per cent to $178.6 million in the three-month...
Citing COVID-19, government waives broadcasters’ Part II license fees
telecom | 12/15/2020 5:25 pm EST
The federal government will waive Part II licensing fees for Canadian broadcasters that have seen advertising downturns due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A Tuesday afternoon press release from Canadian Heritage announced that the CRTC will not collect Part II licensing fees from some radio and television stations. This is the second license fee waiver granted to Canadian broadcasters this year — in March, Heritage minister Stephen Guilbeault announced a waiver of all Part I license fees...
OPC supports PIAC call for CRTC to clarify rules for tracing apps
telecom | 12/01/2020 5:48 pm EST
While it believes the CRTC's existing definition of "customer confidential...
CanCon relief proposal ‘overly broad’, redundant: creative groups
Media | 11/02/2020 6:41 pm EST
In its reply to interventions on the Canadian Association of Broadcasters' request for a policy of "deemed compliance" in Canadian programming expenditures, the Canadian Media Producers Association...
Community radio pushes back on CAB CanCon relief request
Media | 10/30/2020 12:41 pm EDT
The National Campus and Community Radio Association, Alliance des radios communautaires du Canada and Association des radiodiffuseurs communautaires du Québec have filed a joint intervention arguing...
PIAC requests privacy review of contact tracing apps
telecom | 10/29/2020 6:24 pm EDT
Six months after the CRTC declined its request to hold an inquiry into contact tracing technologies and...
Commish ‘frustrated for Canadian citizens’ as privacy laws lag
telecom | 10/08/2020 5:53 pm EDT
The COVID-19 pandemic has heightened privacy concerns around activities...
Rogers still too vague about its use of ITMPs: TekSavvy
telecom | 10/02/2020 4:02 pm EDT
In an ongoing dispute between Rogers Communications Inc. and some of its third party internet access (TPIA) wholesale customers over COVID-19-related internet traffic management practices (ITMPs),...
Videotron launches physical distancing wristband
telecom | 09/24/2020 2:34 pm EDT
Quebecor Inc. has launched a wristband that lights up and vibrates when individuals come too close to...
Throne speech reiterates rural broadband, web giant promises
Media | 09/23/2020 2:54 pm EDT
In Wednesday’s throne speech kicking off Parliament’s return, the...
Back to Parliament: your (pandemic) preview
Media | 09/22/2020 12:43 pm EDT
Given the precarious situation around the now-escalating COVID-19 pandemic, what will actually be included in Wednesday’s speech from the throne, and in the government’s priorities in the following weeks, is more uncertain than ever. With a day to go, even the details of...
STIR/SHAKEN implementation date delayed 9 months
telecom | 09/15/2020 4:27 pm EDT
The CRTC has extended its deadline for telecom providers to implement an anti-call-spoofing protocol known as STIR/SHAKEN by nine months, until June 30, 2021. Telecoms had initially been required to launch the protocol by the...
CRA withholding wage subsidy from Iristel: court filing
telecom | 08/31/2020 5:06 pm EDT
Iristel Inc.'s ongoing fight with the Canada Revenue Agency has become yet more complicated, as the company filed a new application for judicial review Friday, alleging that the CRA improperly...
$263M in deferred spectrum fees due Tuesday: ISED
Media | 08/31/2020 3:00 pm EDT
Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada won’t give any more extensions on the payment of spectrum fees, which are due Sept. 1, the department said. After the COVID-19 pandemic hit, ISED deferred the payment of...
Broadcasters asked CRTC for emergency COVID-19 relief in July
Media | 08/21/2020 4:31 pm EDT
The Canadian Association of Broadcasters asked the CRTC not to enforce...
Committee studies, reports on hold as Parliament prorogued
telecom | 08/18/2020 6:38 pm EDT
With Tuesday's prorogation of Parliament, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has put the brakes on a number of telecom-related studies underway in various House of Commons committees.
The House industry committee had been working on a pair of reports, one about how to deal...
CRTC stepped back to allow telecoms to handle COVID-19
telecom | 08/13/2020 3:37 pm EDT
The CRTC largely played a hands-off role during the COVID-19 pandemic in a...
ISED says department has ‘done well’ with working from home
telecom | 08/10/2020 5:52 pm EDT
Innovation, Science, and Economic Development says it is moving toward establishing a hybrid work-from-home model that will see increasing numbers of employees return to office work in a series of...
eHealth raises data, privacy, and clinical questions: experts
Media | 08/05/2020 6:07 pm EDT
eHealth technologies have been widely billed as bridging divides between...
Telus profits down nearly 40 per cent
telecom | 07/31/2020 4:03 pm EDT
Telus Corp. posted a 39.4 per cent drop in profit in the second quarter of the year, the first quarter to...
UPDATED: OPC now says it supports COVID-19 tracing app
Media | 07/31/2020 8:52 am EDT
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner has cleared up uncertainty about...
Half of spectrum licencees opted to use ISED’s COVID flexibility
telecom | 07/29/2020 5:21 pm EDT
Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada allowed companies to...
Blockbuster Disney production lobbying over COVID-19 protocols
Media | 07/21/2020 6:34 pm EDT
The production company creating a remake of 1940s noir film Nightmare Alley...
Alberta tracing app review could ‘inspire confidence’: privacy expert
telecom | 07/14/2020 6:20 pm EDT
In its long-awaited privacy review of ABTraceTogether, Alberta's COVID-19...
Broadcaster pushes for new multilingual channel as COVID lobbying continues
Media | 07/14/2020 3:33 pm EDT
An Ontario-based ethnic broadcaster lobbying the government for funding to create a multilingual news channel to help Canadians access health information says it’s too early...
Shaw’s subscriber additions dampened by COVID lockdowns
telecom | 07/10/2020 8:39 pm EDT
Shaw Communications Inc. president Paul McAleese said that while there has...
Phase 2 of Heritage emergency support fund to fill in ‘gaps’
Media | 07/07/2020 5:20 pm EDT
The federal government has announced further details of how the $500-million fund it announced in May will be spent, and confirmed the second phase of the COVID-19 Emergency Support Fund for Cultural,...
Pandemic has increased need for privacy rights, OPC told Guilbealt
Media | 06/30/2020 5:08 pm EDT
COVID-19 has made privacy rights even more important, the federal privacy commissioner’s office told Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault in May. A presentation prepared by the Office of the...
Q3 ‘very tough’ for Corus as ad revenues plummet
Media | 06/26/2020 3:27 pm EDT
The financial impacts of COVID-19 induced lockdowns led to a “very tough quarter” for Corus...
Assess privacy before launching contact tracing apps, advocacy groups say
telecom | 06/24/2020 5:09 pm EDT
Contact tracing apps aimed at assisting public health authorities in tracking the spread of COVID-19 shouldn't be launched before privacy commissioners across the country have...
Privacy commissioner hasn’t approved new gov’t contact tracing app
telecom | 06/18/2020 3:48 pm EDT
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Thursday that in developing the federal...
TekSavvy argues Rogers unfairly applying ITMP
telecom | 06/10/2020 4:12 pm EDT
TekSavvy Solutions Inc. has asked the CRTC to force Rogers Communications Inc. to stop applying an...
Monsef tight-lipped on rural broadband funding announcement
telecom | 06/05/2020 5:01 pm EDT
Rural Economic Development Minister Maryam Monsef says “precise...
ISED delays 3500 MHz auction by six months
telecom | 06/05/2020 1:45 pm EDT
The 3500 MHz spectrum auction, originally scheduled for December of this year, will now take place in...
Competition Bureau, telecoms MVNO stance unchanged by COVID-19
telecom | 06/03/2020 6:00 pm EDT
The Competition Bureau says its advocacy for a temporary hybrid mobile...
Outdated privacy laws may hamper COVID-19 tracing: Therrien
telecom | 05/29/2020 7:00 pm EDT
The outdated state of Canadian privacy laws may harm efforts to launch a...
SaskTel to resume charging overage fees on June 9
telecom | 05/29/2020 2:13 pm EDT
Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corp. will become the second Canadian telecom to resume charging overage fees to home internet customers who go over their data caps, with the company announcing it will end the COVID-19...
Network performance supports light regulatory touch: Bibic
telecom | 05/27/2020 6:58 pm EDT
The performance of networks in other countries during the COVID-19 crisis...
Advertising market in ‘modest recovery’: Corus
Media | 05/27/2020 6:34 pm EDT
Canada’s television advertising market has moved to a stage of “modest recovery” after chapters of COVID-19 pandemic induced “shock and awe,” followed by a stabilisation period, Corus Entertainment Inc. CEO Doug Murphy told Wednesday’s TD Securities Telecom and...
Roam Mobility shutting down
telecom | 05/27/2020 5:25 pm EDT
Otono Networks Inc.’s Roam Mobility will cease operations on June 30, the company said Wednesday. Roam Mobility previously provided prepaid SIM cards for visitors to the United States and Canada. It shut down the Canadian service in January, though it continued to provide SIM cards and service...
Google exec outlines privacy measures in new contact-tracing API
telecom | 05/22/2020 2:54 pm EDT
Colin McKay, head of public policy and government relations for Canada for...
Incumbents ask court for delay of wholesale rate appeal
telecom | 05/21/2020 6:01 pm EDT
Incumbent cable companies have asked a Federal Court of Appeal judge to delay their appeal of the CRTC's wholesale rates decision until the proceeding can be conducted in person. In a letter...
Fraudsters cashing in on pandemic, committee told
telecom | 05/20/2020 8:05 pm EDT
The Canadian Anti Fraud Centre has received almost 1000 complaints about fraud attempts related to...
Telus to share aggregate location data with government researchers
telecom | 05/20/2020 6:09 pm EDT
Telus Corp. said it will begin providing de-identified, aggregate location data to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) to help combat COVID-19. It said in a press release that Telus will “share insights with NSERC researchers free of charge and provide supervised and guided access to strongly de-identified and aggregated network mobility data.” Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, provincial and federal governments have indicated their...
2025 offered as connectivity target as pressure to fast track rises
telecom | 05/19/2020 2:01 pm EDT
Universal connectivity at the CRTC’s universal service objective speeds...
Spectrum funds could achieve broadband targets before 2030: telecoms
telecom | 05/14/2020 9:35 pm EDT
An NDP plan for the federal government to add money raised from past and...
Rovi’s STB suit against Quebecor will proceed via Zoom
Media | 05/13/2020 4:14 pm EDT
A Federal Court proceeding between Quebecor Inc.'s Videotron and Rovi Guides Inc. that was halted in early March as the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns began, will resume via Zoom, over the objections of...
CRTC rejects request to hold contact-tracing inquiry
telecom | 05/13/2020 4:09 pm EDT
The CRTC has rejected a Public Interest Advocacy Centre request that it look into the involvement of...
COVID-19 accelerating rural/urban connectivity divide: CIRA
telecom | 05/08/2020 5:49 pm EDT
Rural home internet speeds during the first full month where Canadians shifted to working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic were almost 12 times slower than the median speed for urban Canadians,...
Canadians broadly supportive of COVID-19 tracing apps: survey
telecom | 05/08/2020 5:41 pm EDT
Some eight in 10 Canadians support the use of wireless data to track the spread of COVID-19, and 65 per cent of Canadians think it should be mandatory, according to a survey released by three federal...
Guilbeault details $500M relief for arts and culture
telecom | 05/08/2020 5:02 pm EDT
Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault Friday released more details on how a previously-announced...
Telus withdraws guidance, records 19 per cent net income reduction
telecom | 05/07/2020 6:00 pm EDT
Telus Corp.’s net income for the first quarter of 2020 dropped 19 per...
Bell calls for delayed payments in 3.5 GHz spectrum auction
telecom | 05/07/2020 5:59 pm EDT
While BCE Inc.'s first quarter results showed a decline in profits and essentially flat revenue -- and the expected withdrawal of fiscal year 2020 guidance -- the company will continue to pay out dividends to shareholders, CEO Mirko Bibic told analysts on a first quarterly...
5G monitoring same as for all wireless tech: Health Canada
telecom | 05/06/2020 3:16 pm EDT
Health Canada has responded to an MPs’ query about what steps it is...
Conservatives and NDP united for enforcement of wholesale rates
telecom | 05/05/2020 5:27 pm EDT
Opposition parties that normally hold differing views on any given issue...
PIAC calls for providers to detail COVID-19 tracing involvement
telecom | 05/04/2020 6:14 pm EDT
The Public Interest Advocacy Centre is asking for all Canadian...
Shaw to lay off about 100 British Columbia field technicians
telecom | 05/01/2020 3:35 pm EDT
Shaw Communications Inc. plans to permanently lay off about 100 field technicians in British Columbia’s Lower Mainland, stating the COVID-19 pandemic had “only accelerated” the company’s...
Provinces also looking at speeding up rural broadband rollouts
telecom | 05/01/2020 1:10 pm EDT
As the federal government and individual companies work on accelerating funding for and deployments of rural broadband in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a number of provinces are trying to do the same with their own programs.
“I don’t think there is a province or...
Cogeco to bring back overage fees as of May 1
telecom | 04/30/2020 2:10 pm EDT
Cogeco Inc. will again start charging overage fees to its home internet customers who exceed their data limits as of Friday, with the company instead focusing on other measures it considers to “be more essential” to its...
Federal government to accelerate rural broadband funds: Monsef
telecom | 04/29/2020 3:49 pm EDT
The federal government will speed up its rural broadband funding in...
CRTC to review wholesale rate setting approach
Media | 04/24/2020 3:16 pm EDT
The CRTC has launched a public consultation into whether the approach it uses to set wholesale rates should be changed, stating it’s seeking to establish a “more transparent and efficient process” while ensuring rates remain...
Bell speeding up rural broadband rollout
telecom | 04/23/2020 3:30 pm EDT
BCE Inc. will be delivering its fixed wireless internet to some 137,000 more homes than it had planned to...
Rogers revenue drops 5%, withdraws guidance due to COVID-19
Media | 04/22/2020 3:44 pm EDT
Rogers Communications Inc. recorded a five per cent drop in revenue in the...
Telecoms, broadcasters lobbying on COVID-19 effects
Media | 04/21/2020 5:28 pm EDT
Telecom and media companies, including Quebecor Inc. and Corus Entertainment Inc., have begun adding COVID-19-related registrations to their lobby files in recent weeks. On April 15, Corus added “discussions of...
Lockdown extending to July could put $2.5B of production work at risk: report
Media | 04/21/2020 5:11 pm EDT
A COVID-19 induced lockdown of the country will put $2.5 billion of film and television production work at risk of disruption or permanent loss if it lasts until the end of June, a new report prepared...
2020 a ‘lost year’ for telecom growth: analyst
telecom | 04/20/2020 5:35 pm EDT
The telecommunications sector will have an "irrelevant" first quarter and will "write off" the second...
Quebecor hits out at Bell’s ‘unfounded’ IBW extension request
telecom | 04/20/2020 4:36 pm EDT
Quebecor Inc. has urged the CRTC to deny a BCE Inc. request to indefinitely postpone its consultation on access to fibre in-building wire in multi-dwelling units, labelling...
Gov’t in ‘early stages’ of using cellphone data for COVID-19 tracking: Bains
telecom | 04/20/2020 3:40 pm EDT
The federal government is looking at what other jurisdictions are doing...
Bell donating 1.5 million masks to provinces, federal gov’t
Media | 04/17/2020 2:01 pm EDT
BCE Inc. announced Friday that it has acquired 1.5 million N95 and KN95...
Bell calls for new in-building wire tariff to be put on ice
telecom | 04/16/2020 5:47 pm EDT
A process to create a tariff for access to in-building wire in...
Wholesale appeal is on shaky legal footing, TekSavvy argues
telecom | 04/16/2020 5:39 pm EDT
The ongoing appeal by incumbent telecoms of the CRTC's wholesale internet rates decision from August should be dismissed because the appeal argues that the regulator made errors in fact, rather than...
CRTC approves Bell’s ‘urgent’ Wangiri-blocking request
telecom | 04/16/2020 5:17 pm EDT
After BCE Inc. asked it to grant an "urgent" approval to block the one-ring phone scam calls known as Wangiri calls at the end of March, on account of the increased call...
Pump the brakes on COVID data tracking, advocacy groups warn
telecom | 04/15/2020 5:35 pm EDT
Despite the extraordinary desire to stop the spread of COVID-19, there is still no justification for mass unwarranted surveillance of identifiable people, according to a joint statement of principles...
Shaw lays off ten per cent of workforce due to COVID-19
telecom | 04/14/2020 6:04 pm EDT
Shaw Communications Inc. will temporarily lay off about ten per cent of its...
38% of Canadians say COVID-19 slowed internet service: CIRA survey
telecom | 04/14/2020 5:15 pm EDT
Almost four in ten Canadians say their home internet speeds are slower than they were before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a survey conducted for the Canadian Internet Registration Authority...
Provinces collaborating on cellphone tracking: Tam
telecom | 04/14/2020 2:19 pm EDT
Canadian authorities are “pulling together a group amongst the provinces and territories to gauge interest” in using cellphone data to track the spread of COVID-19, Canada’s chief public health officer, Theresa Tam, said...
Incumbents using COVID-19 to tamper with procedures, CNOC, TekSavvy claim
telecom | 04/09/2020 8:07 pm EDT
The Canadian Network Operators Consortium (CNOC) and TekSavvy Solutions Inc. are alleging that the incumbent telecoms from whom they purchase wholesale high-speed internet access are making changes to...
CRTC delays launch of new proceedings due to COVID-19
Media | 04/09/2020 6:47 pm EDT
The CRTC has delayed the launch of new proceedings due to COVID-19, stating it’s aware the telecommunications industry’s primary focus is on delivering services to Canadians. In a statement...
Rempel Garner calls on Bains, CRTC to enforce wholesale rates
telecom | 04/09/2020 5:15 pm EDT
Conservative industry critic Michelle Rempel Garner has called on...
COVID-19 delays next-gen 911 network roll-out
telecom | 04/09/2020 3:38 pm EDT
The CRTC has pushed back a series of deadlines around the implementation of next-generation 911 (NG911) services, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In a letter published to the CRTC’s website on Thursday, the regulator said the...
Cogeco pre-COVID Q2 revs steady, adjusts share buyback
telecom | 04/08/2020 6:57 pm EDT
Amid the financial uncertainty and upheaval of the COVID-19 global pandemic, Cogeco Inc. will adjust its share repurchasing program, the company's executives told analysts on a Wednesday morning second quarter earnings call.
While the company is making the adjustment to...
Bains says he’s in ‘constant contact’ with telecoms over network capacity
telecom | 04/08/2020 4:24 pm EDT
Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains says the...
CNOC calls for gov’t funding to keep Canadians connected
telecom | 04/07/2020 5:40 pm EDT
The federal government should guarantee internet service providers payments...
Quebec City police used location data to track infected individual
telecom | 04/06/2020 5:15 pm EDT
In March, Quebec City police used cellphone location data to track and then arrest a woman infected with COVID-19 who refused to self-isolate. The Canadian Press quoted Quebec City chief Robert...
Watchdog Friends calls for emergency media fund
telecom | 04/06/2020 2:43 pm EDT
Friends of Canadian Broadcasting has urged the federal government to help prominent media outlets facing...
TVA news staff to return to Sherbrooke following positive COVID-19 tests
telecom | 04/02/2020 4:30 pm EDT
Quebecor Inc.’s TVA news team in Sherbrooke, Que. will return to the station on Friday after receiving the all clear from Quebec Public Health, the company says. In a statement in French, Quebecor said viewers from Estrie would have their local noon and 6 p.m. bulletins return on Friday, four days after the station closed following a manager testing positive for the COVID-19 virus. The local programming was replaced with TVA news network bulletins while the station was closed. The...
Calm before the COVID storm in Corus Q2
telecom | 04/01/2020 5:14 pm EDT
Corus Entertainment Inc. has deferred the declaration of its dividends in response to the uncertainty...
Canadian authorities in talks about COVID-19 tracking apps
telecom | 03/31/2020 5:54 pm EDT
Several of Canada’s cities and provinces, as well as the federal...
Telus Health ‘scaling up’ as COVID-19 spreads
telecom | 03/30/2020 5:11 pm EDT
Telus Corp.’s years-long investment in e-health and telemedicine has...
Quebecor, Cogeco lay off staff due to COVID-19
telecom | 03/27/2020 4:26 pm EDT
Quebecor Inc. and Cogeco Inc. have both announced staff layoffs due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Quebecor announced on Friday morning it would lay off 10 per cent of its workforce, which the company said amounted to about 1000...
Netflix lowers Canadian bit rate for next 30 days
telecom | 03/27/2020 12:44 pm EDT
Netflix Inc. has announced it will lower its bit rate in Canada by 25 per cent for the next 30 days, just days after three telecommunications associations publicly urged the streaming giant to lower rates to lessen network...
Teksavvy lays off staff, increases internet bills
telecom | 03/26/2020 6:39 pm EDT
Teksavvy Solutions Inc. has laid off 130 staff and will implement a flat $5 bill increase for its...
Networks coping, but future traffic impossible to predict
Media | 03/25/2020 5:48 pm EDT
Experts say Canada’s telecommunications networks are currently handling a...
Feds, 4 provinces not looking at COVID-19 phone tracking
telecom | 03/24/2020 12:39 pm EDT
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday the federal government isn’t...
Media companies face more uncertainty than telecoms: analyst
Media | 03/23/2020 3:39 pm EDT
The next period of time — no one knows just how long — will be "riddled with both demand and supply shocks," and the country's biggest media companies are in for a much bumpier financial ride than the telecom companies, according to RBC Capital Markets analyst Drew McReynolds. In a note published Friday, McReynolds wrote that the "unprecedented lack of visibility at this juncture is putting a hefty premium on balance sheet and liquidity positions and the ability to 'make it through' regardless of what economic and/or banking/financial sector outcome (if not crisis) lies ahead"...