Canada’s Digital Charter does not comfort Alphabet’s smart-city critics

FILE PHOTO: The downtown skyline and CN Tower are seen past the eastern waterfront area envisioned by Alphabet Inc's Sidewalk Labs as a new technical hub in the Port Lands district of Toronto, Ontario, Canada March 29, 2019. Picture taken March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Chris Helgren/File Photo

TORONTO: Canada's Digital Charter lacks sufficient legal enforcement power to effectively protect privacy and regulate use of personal data, according to critics worried that a smart city project in Toronto by Alphabet's Sidewalk Labs unit could be misused for mass surveillance.

The Digital Charter was announced this month to guide Canada on data and the digital economy, and mentions concerns about smart cities. Sidewalk Toronto is a data-driven urban development project that Sidewalk Labs has proposed for the city's harbourfront. The smart city development would use sensors in public areas to detect energy use, traffic and pollution.