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Canada Parliament Questions Google Over Paying For News

By  |  March 13, 2023

Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet Corporation, informed a Canadian Parliamentary committee on Friday that it would discontinue making news articles unavailable to users based in certain parts of Canada beginning March 16th.

Last month, Google started testing limited news censorship as a potential response to a Canadian government bill that aims to compel online platforms to pay publishers in Canada for news content.

Google has claimed that the test is like thousands of other product tests the company conducts on a regular basis.

Read more: Canada Will Force Google, Facebook To Pay For News

The tests, which the company says affected less than 4% of Canadian users, began on Feb. 9 and were scheduled to run for five weeks.

Speaking to a parliamentary committee investigating the tests, Google’s public policy manager Jason Kee confirmed that the tests would end next week.

“I want to underline these are just tests. No decisions have been made about product changes,” Kee said.