{"id":228162,"date":"2025-10-21T01:01:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T01:01:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/228162\/"},"modified":"2025-10-21T01:01:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T01:01:16","slug":"cbc-asks-court-to-keep-gem-subscriber-numbers-confidential-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/228162\/","title":{"rendered":"CBC asks court to keep Gem subscriber numbers confidential – National"},"content":{"rendered":"

CBC\/Radio-Canada<\/a> has filed an application in Federal Court<\/a> to fight an order directing it to disclose subscriber numbers for its Gem<\/a> streaming service.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The information commissioner ordered CBC<\/a> to make available the number of paid subscribers to Gem following an access-to-information request for the data.<\/p>\n

CBC\/Radio-Canada president Marie-Philippe Bouchard told The Canadian Press the subscriber numbers are sensitive commercial information.<\/p>\n

That confidentiality matters when it comes to things like commercial negotiations on bundling Gem with other streaming services, Bouchard added.<\/p>\n

The public broadcaster is \u201ccharged with making some of our budget out of commercial relationships,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that has to be played according to the rules of the market. And so we\u2019re finding ourselves, with this ruling, uncomfortable with the interpretation.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In refusing to disclose the numbers, CBC cited exemptions for programming activities and information that could harm its competitive position.<\/p>\n

In her final report on the access-to-information complaint, Information Commissioner Caroline Maynard said the subscriber numbers relate to CBC\u2019s programming activities, but they also relate to its general administration \u2014 which means the exemption to disclosure does not apply.<\/p>\n

Maynard said while \u201cCBC did identify possible harms to its competitive position or to ongoing negotiations, it did not demonstrate that there was a reasonable expectation that these harms could occur, well beyond a mere possibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The information commissioner\u2019s ruling contradicts the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission\u2019s interpretation of what constitutes \u201csensitive commercial information,\u201d Bouchard said.<\/p>\n

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Bouchard said CBC\/Radio-Canada wants the courts to provide clarity on the issue.<\/p>\n

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CBC launched the Gem streaming service, which has both paid and free versions, in 2018. The paid version, which costs $5.99 a month, includes ad-free on-demand streaming and a stream of CBC\u2019s 24-hour news channel, CBC News Network.<\/p>\n

Paid subscribers \u201care not what makes Gem,\u201d Bouchard said. \u201cGem is mainly a free-to-user service. And the paid part is really a commodity for people who don\u2019t want advertising.\u201d<\/p>\n

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CBC does not disclose the number of paid or unpaid subscribers to Gem.<\/p>\n

In its notice of application, CBC\/Radio-Canada asks the court to set aside the information commissioner\u2019s order and declare that Gem records are exempt from disclosure.<\/p>\n

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It argues the public broadcaster \u201coperates in a highly competitive environment in which foreign and domestic private and community broadcasters and other digital streamers offer their own programming on their respective distribution platforms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bouchard was pressed on the question Monday afternoon during an appearance at the House of Commons heritage committee.<\/p>\n

Conservative MP Kevin Waugh asked Bouchard whether she was \u201cembarrassed\u201d by the number.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d she responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t you come out and just say, here\u2019s the numbers that we got,\u201d Waugh asked again, telling Bouchard to \u201cgive us some numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Bouchard responded that more than five million people have created an account.<\/p>\n

In a later exchange with Waugh, Bouchard said the CRTC allows businesses to \u201cconsider that information confidential,\u201d while the information commissioner\u2019s interpretation \u201csays that we have not met the standard for that confidentiality.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want reconciliation between those two interpretations, and that\u2019s why we asked the Federal Court to consider the situation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Waugh disagreed, telling Bouchard: \u201cI don\u2019t know what you\u2019re hiding. I really don\u2019t, because you\u2019re a public broadcaster, you\u2019re getting the funds from the public, and you\u2019re not in competition with Bell Media, Crave or any of those.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t&copy 2025 The Canadian Press\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CBC\/Radio-Canada has filed an application in Federal Court to fight an order directing it to disclose subscriber numbers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":228163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48,14470,40021,75,78593,108951],"class_list":["post-228162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cbc","tag-cbc-gem","tag-entertainment","tag-federal-court","tag-gem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/228163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}