Federal government warning of voter coercion, foreign election interference through private messaging services | CBC News
February 9,2020|The federal government is worriedabout the risk of voter coercion and foreign election interference through private messaging services — a concern that could pit the right to privacy and free expression against Canada's election laws.
Taylor Owen on deepfakes | CBC The National
January 7, 2020| There are serious concerns about how Facebook will police deepfake videos. Max Bell School professor Taylor Owen talks about why these sophisticated videos need editorial oversight.
Chris Ragan on carbon pricing | Power and Politics
November 27, 2019 | Max Bell School Director Chris Ragan discusses theEcofiscal Commission's final report on how Canada can meet its 2030 emissions goals with a carbon pricing policy.
Watch the video here.
Here’s why you should like the federal carbon tax | The Star
November 27, 2019 | In this opinion piece, it is argued howan escalating carbon price over the years accompanied by rebates, as shown by Chris Ragan,is the most transparent and the least costly for the economy and taxpayers.
Read the full article here.
Hiking carbon tax to $210 cheapest way to hit climate targets: commission | CTV News
November 27, 2019 | Chris Ragan, Director of the Max Bell School says quadrupling Canada's carbon price by 2030 is the easiest and most cost-effective way for the country to meet its climate targets.
Read the full article here.
Why Carbon Pricing Remains the Smartest Policy Tool | Policy Options
November 27, 2019 | Director of the Max Bell School Chris Ragan on why the time is right for a serious conversation about how best to bridge the gap between Canada’s current emissions and our 2030 target.
Read the full article here.
Canada needs carbon tax of $210 a tonne by 2030 to meet Paris targets, report says | National Post
November 27, 2019 |The Ecofiscal Commission saysCanada will either have to raise carbon prices to $210 per tonne or adopt more expensive policies funded by higher income taxes to meet its 2030targets.
Read the full article here.
Canada should quadruple carbon tax to meet 2030 targets, commission says | The Globe and Mail
November 27, 2019 | The Ecofiscal Commission's latest report says that if Canada were to meet its 2030 targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions through carbon pricing, it must more than quadruple its carbon tax and rebate the revenues to consumers.
Read the full article here.
Mark Jaccard and Chris Ragan: This time, let’s set climate targets — and achieve them too | Vancouver Sun
October 7, 2019 | In this opinion piece in the Vancouver Sun, Max Bell School Director Chris Ragan and Mark Jaccard, Director at the School of Resource and Environmental Management at Simon Fraser University, argue: "the impacts of a ۲ݮƵ climate — from forests fires to heatwaves to floods — are getting worse and are making life harder for Canadians. A commitment to achieve deep emissions reductions by 2050 in Canada is consistent with the scale of the threat."
19 million Canadians have had their data breached in eight months
September 2, 2019| An estimated 19 million Canadians have been affected by data breaches between November 2018 and June 2019, according to numbers obtained by "Attention Control with Kevin Newman," a new podcast that launched Monday. The numbers come from 446 breaches that were reported to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC). Victims of these kinds of data breaches are vulnerable to identity theft, financial crime, even violence in some cases.
Canadian polarized, but social media use likely not the culprit: study
September 12, 2019 | Social media might not be to blame for Canadians’ ideological polarization, a new report on digital democracy in Canada finds. “A lot of people don’t use social media very actively,” said Eric Merkley, a researcher on the project. “People on Twitter are not representative of the broader population.”
Fake news preys on emotions, expert warns
August 10, 2019| Beware of things you see online that make you emotional, one media expert warns ahead of the fall election. Taylor Owen, professor at ۲ݮƵ University and the co-creator of the Digital Democracy Project, says fake news often preys on feelings like anger and fear.
Listen to the Interview
Canadians' media-consumption habits lead to misinformation, study finds
August 7, 2019| Canadians aren’t as divided into partisan echo chambers as social media would suggest, but a heavy news diet doesn't guarantee you'll be informed, a new study has found.
Read the Article
The government just made its toxic media bailout plan even worse
May 24, 2019 | The news release putby Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez begins well: "The Government of Canada understands that for a democracy to function properly, it needs to have solid, independent news media."
If only he had stopped there. But instead, the release goes on for another 700words to outline a plan whose principal effect will be to undermine the independence of the news media.
The Hill Times features Digital Democracy Project
August 29, 2019 | The latest data from the Digital Democracy Project suggests that while 17 per cent of respondents indicated the environment was a top election issue, on par with health care, and second to the economy at 20 per cent, support for reducing emissions through a carbon price is soft, even among left-leaning voters.