Keldon Bester, executive director of the Canadian Anti-Monopoly Project (CAMP) and fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), argues that Canada faces an unprecedented challenge from American technology companies at a moment when the geopolitical relationship with the United States has become unstable.
The political landscape shifted dramatically during Canada's recent election. What observers expected to be a Conservative landslide instead produced a minority Liberal government under Prime Minister Carney, with voters prioritizing who could best manage relations with the current American President. Yet beyond the immediate political upheaval lies a deeper structural problem: Canada's economy and society depend heavily on a small number of American tech firms.
This dependency has long existed, but two assumptions that once justified it no longer hold. The first—that Canada and the US would maintain a stable relationship—has been shattered. The second—that American government and its major technology companies operate at arm's length—has proven false. Together, these shifts transform tech regulation from a routine policy matter into a question of national sovereignty.
The Scope of Tech Dependence
The concentration of power in digital markets mirrors patterns elsewhere, but the consequences for Canada are acute. Most Canadians use Meta platforms regularly. Google's search dominance in Canada matches its global position. Google, Meta, and Amazon collectively control nearly 90% of online advertising spending. Half of Canadian businesses and the federal government rely on cloud services from Amazon, Microsoft, and Google.
What policymakers once framed as competition or privacy concerns now appears as a sovereignty threat. Access to information, communication channels, and commercial infrastructure all flow through conglomerates headquartered in an increasingly unreliable partner. Before 2025, most considered foreign interference through these channels unthinkable.
Canada's Previous Tech Accountability Efforts
Canada has not ignored Big Tech's power. Two recent laws—C-11 and C-18, the Online Streaming and Online News Acts—required technology companies to support Canadian cultural and news industries. Meta responded by banning Canadian news from Facebook and Instagram, degrading Canadians' information environment. Similar threats have come from tech giants facing regulation in Australia and California, demonstrating a pattern of corporate pressure on governments.
Canada also led G7 nations in adopting a digital services tax to ensure fair taxation of digital companies regardless of headquarters. The Competition Act underwent significant reforms in 2023 and 2024, strengthening the Competition Bureau's authority to investigate anti-competitive behavior by dominant firms. Canada's forthcoming litigation against Google for alleged abuse of dominance in online advertising may test these new powers.
Several other bills aimed at tech accountability stalled when Parliament suspended in early 2025. Bill C-26 sought to strengthen cybersecurity for critical infrastructure. Bill C-27 would have modernized privacy protections. Bill C-63 addressed online harms through content moderation rules. Each represented an attempt to reclaim control over dimensions of Canadian economic and social life from a handful of corporations.
Reframing Tech Policy as Sovereignty
These initiatives proceeded under the assumption that tech regulation was important but routine. The Carney government's recent Speech from the Throne emphasized rebuilding defense capabilities and strengthening international relationships to protect sovereignty. Yet defense spending and trade agreements cannot address Canada's dependence on American technology for economic and social infrastructure.
The government must adopt a tech accountability agenda grounded in anti-monopoly principles. Rather than accepting the distribution of wealth from American tech dominance, Canada should prioritize sovereignty preservation, diversify control in critical markets, and deepen cooperation with reliable allies to counter risks from dominant firms.
Immediate Priorities
The Carney government should move quickly to protect Canada from abuse by American technology firms. This requires updating previous legislative efforts to reflect current geopolitical conditions. Specific measures should include requirements for domestic data and cloud infrastructure, strengthened cybersecurity and privacy protections, and intensified efforts to prevent foreign interference in Canada's information ecosystem. The government has foundations to build on and can consolidate previous scattered efforts around the core question of preserving Canadian sovereignty.
Canada must maintain resolve on existing efforts to constrain dominant tech companies rather than hoping for lenient treatment in exchange for capitulation. The Competition Bureau's case against Google's advertising monopoly exemplifies this commitment. The Trump administration will likely pressure Canada to abandon or weaken such cases. The critical error would be treating competition policy as a narrow issue rather than one front in Canada's sovereignty struggle. Retreating on competition today invites similar retreats on privacy, taxation, and defense tomorrow.
Abandoning competition enforcement also contradicts the government's goal of reducing living costs for Canadians. Without global antitrust actions breaking up monopolies, Canada must pursue its own competition efforts to benefit from greater digital market dynamism. Epic Games' recent victory against Apple reshaped what control monopolists can exercise over closed platforms. While American consumers may soon avoid Apple's 30% fee through alternative apps, Canadian consumers will continue paying monopoly rates without parallel domestic action. By learning from international partners' investigations and legislation, Canada can help establish global standards for fair digital competition.
Long-Term Diversification
Canada must ensure that 2025's circumstances never recur. The relationship with the United States, shaped by history and geography, functions as a monopoly. As with corporate monopolies, the customer loses control under such arrangements. Canadians may hope that outlasting the Trump administration will restore business as usual. This cannot be the default strategy.
Reducing dependence on American infrastructure like computing power requires sustained effort beginning immediately. Beyond previous initiatives, the Carney government should develop legislation preventing discrimination against Canadian firms and supporting alternatives to American infrastructure for both businesses and government. Addressing Canada's monopoly problem, diversifying relationships, and building stronger alliances with a broader range of like-minded partners—rather than isolating Canada—will preserve independence.
As a middle power, Canada faces significant obstacles in reasserting sovereignty against global technology giants. Recent progress must be updated to address the monopoly dynamics underlying the new geopolitical reality. Canada must maintain its regulatory authority over companies operating within its borders regardless of origin. Finally, Canada must apply anti-monopoly lessons by diversifying and decentralizing the markets supporting its economic and social infrastructure.
The easiest path will push Canada toward reverting to comfortable assumptions that have guided policymaking for decades. Recognizing those assumptions as obsolete represents the essential first step toward a different future.
Source: Tech Policy Press
