Google to Yank All Links to Canadian News Outlets, Citing New Media Law
Google has vowed to remove all links to Canadian news outlets from its search engine in the wake of Canada’s newly passed media law.
The drastic action is in response to the Online News Act (Bill C-18), which will require Google and Meta to compensate Canadian news sites for content that appears on their platforms.
Google is now joining Meta to say it won’t play ball. “We have now informed the Government that when the law takes effect, we unfortunately will have to remove links to Canadian news from our Search, News, and Discover products in Canada,” the company said in a blog post(Opens in a new window) on Thursday.
In addition, the tech giant is halting its Google News Showcase platform in Canada, which pays “participating publishers to curate quality journalism.” The company’s decision threatens to deprive Canadian users of important news, given Google’s popularity across desktops and smartphones. But the tech giant says it has no choice because the Online News Act is inherently unfair to the company.
“Last year alone, Google linked to Canadian news publishers more than 3.6 billion times, helping them make money with ads and new subscriptions. This free traffic drove an estimated $250 million CAD worth of value to Canadian publishers,” Google says in an FAQ(Opens in a new window).
“However, Bill C-18 changes this. It puts a price on links (a 'link tax'), and when you put a price on linking to information, you no longer have a free and open web,” the company claims.
If Google goes through with the threat, Canadian users can expect a very different news experience. The company’s FAQ further adds: “Canadians will continue to be able to access all news sites by typing the outlet's web address directly into their
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