

The bill will come into force six months from Thursday. Meta would not offer details about the timeline for that move, but said it will pull local news from its site before the Online News Act takes effect. Meta confirmed Thursday that it plans to comply with the bill by ending news availability on Facebook and Instagram for its Canadian users, as it had previously suggested. And Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez has promised to push back on what he describes as “threats” from Facebook and Google to remove journalism from their platforms. Ottawa has said the law creates a level playing field between online advertising giants and the shrinking news industry. The Senate passed the bill Thursday in a final vote and was given royal assent amid a standoff between the Liberal government and Silicon Valley tech giants. OTTAWA - A federal bill that will require Google and Meta to pay media outlets for news content that they share or otherwise repurpose on their platforms has become law.
