Canada’s proposed Bill C-22, known as the Lawful Access Act, has pushed encrypted messaging service Signal, VPN provider Windscribe and other companies to threaten to leave Canada. The bill has also split Canada’s parliament, sparking daily warnings from opposition MPs. Across the Southern border, too, U.S. congressional committees are warning that the bill threatens American security, setting up an international frontier if the Canadian government continues to push to pass the problematic Bill C-22. Which companies want to exit Canada? The backlash that the Canadian government is facing after it proposed the Lawful Access Act (C-22) bill has reached new levels. The legislation, introduced by Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree in March 2026, would make it compulsory for telecoms, internet companies, and messaging platforms to retain metadata for up to one year and also allow the government access to force surveillance capabilities into private technology. Conservative MP Dean Allison has been posting daily warnings on X, framing Bill C-22 as the third and most dangerous step in a pattern of government control over the internet. “First it was Bill C-11 controlling what Canadians see online. Then Bill C-18 blocking and manipulating access to news. Now Bill C-22 takes the next step: surveillance and state control,” Allison wrote. He went on to compare Canada’s approach to censorship to other countries, writing “the Liberals are copying the far left government of the UK.” Signal pushed back against the bill with threats of leaving Canada. Windscribe followed suit, saying on X that VPNs would almost certainly be required to log identifying user data under the bill’s current state. “Signal isn’t headquartered in Canada so they can just shut off Canadian servers, but our HQ is,” Windscribe wrote . The company went on to mention that it pays an “ungodly amount” to the Canadian government in taxes, and would rather move its headquarters and the taxes that come with it elsewhere rather than assist the government to “spy on its own citizens.” NordVPN stated that it would consider leaving the Canadian market if the bill forces it to weaken encryption or abandon its no-logging policy. Governments globally are trying to increase surveillance Jasmin Laine, a political commentator, referred to Bill C-11 and C-18 as a “catastrophe” for local news distribution and grassroots digital publishers. “We are being silenced by the very laws promised to give us a voice,” Laine wrote. “Spare me with the saviour superiority complex. The only thing we need saving from is this technocratic, totalitarian-leaning government overreach.” Earlier in the year, Cryptopolitan reported that Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), and Samsung ( KRX: 005930) rejected a request from telecommunication providers in India to launch a satellite location tracking feature that cannot be turned off by users. In a separate incident, Apple withdrew its Advanced Data Protection feature from the United Kingdom last year after the British government demanded access to encrypted iCloud data. Meta is currently litigating that order , but the company has warned that the bill’s scope is so broad it could force companies to “install government spyware directly on their systems.” The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a digital rights group, has criticized C-22 for being vague about its definitions of both “systemic vulnerabilities” and “encryption,” stating that it leaves wiggle room for the government to demand that companies circumvent encryption. Why are U.S. lawmakers warning about a Canadian bill? Last week, Republican Jim Jordan, chair of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, and Brian Mast, who leads the Foreign Affairs Committee, sent a letter to Public Safety Minister Anandasangaree warning that the bill would “drastically expand Canada’s surveillance and data-access powers in ways that create significant cross-border risks to the security and data privacy of Americans.” The letter stated that U.S. companies operating in Canada would have to choose between compromising the security of their entire user base or leaving the Canadian market. Worryingly, Ruby Sahota, the Secretary of State for Combatting Crime, said that Bill C-22 is a “first step” during the second reading debate. A police chief later told the same committee to consider three years of metadata retention, stating it “would be ideal.” The bill remains before the Commons committee, and so far, the warnings have had no effect. If you're reading this, you’re already ahead. Stay there with our newsletter .
