By Shellie Troy

When we think of 911 we think of the caring, heroic emergency responders in Police, Fire, Ambulance, and Search and Rescue. They come when we call; they rush toward danger as we’re fleeing it; they care so much for those in crisis that they can jeopardize their own safety. We hold them in high regard.

But analog is ending. The Canadian Radio and Television Commission (CRTC) has mandated that the official decommissioning date for existing 911 services is 2027, with the services to be replaced by Next Generation (NG) 911.¹

Digital Internet Protocol (IP) has begun, and it’s a juggernaut.

Messaging adroitly sells the upgrades: “Today, large-scale emergencies—from pandemics to natural disasters—demand faster, highly coordinated, and more precise responses. With traditional 911 systems, however, public safety infrastructures are often outdated, overwhelmed, and lack the ability to handle modern disaster scenarios with the efficiency needed.”²

“As public safety becomes more data-intensive, NG 911 will be central to improving emergency response speed, accuracy, and situational awareness, with growth favouring providers that simplify deployments, ensure secure interoperability, and convert expanding data sources into actionable intelligence.”³

Selling digital IP to the public takes many forms. Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) recommends “demonstration projects in provinces or regions without existing SDI [Serial Digital Interface] infrastructure to show benefits and gain traction. [Remember COVID messaging about gaining traction for mRNA?] Bundle SDI funding into initiatives with strong public resonance, such as climate monitoring, emergency services, and wildfire detection.”

During a recent CBC Radio One broadcast, their “expert” predicted a “devastating fire season ahead,” and the reporter added, “The government is currently updating emergency services.” Despite most people knowing absolutely nothing about it, corporate marketing is claiming NG 911 is “what the people demand.”

More like what data capitalism demands. One headline reads, “Next Generation 911 Opportunity to Exceed $1.5 Billion in Revenues by 2030 as Public Safety Transforms into a Data-Driven, AI-Enabled Ecosystem.” A fintech blog reports, “NG 911 utilizes more types of data, including from smart devices and data-rich information from a variety of sources such as vehicle sensors, wearable medical devices, smart home alarms, building sensors and monitoring systems.” Entrepreneurs talk about creating new revenue streams and data-related services, selling data packages to third parties, and making information subscription-based.

The CRTC’s NG 911 Commission declares Canada is open for business: “NG 9-1-1 networks should be accessible to all types of entities, to the maximum extent possible.” IBM predicts rapid, outstanding growth: “In 2023, the global data monetization market was valued at USD 3.5 billion, and experts project it to reach USD 14.4 billion by 2032, demonstrating a compound annual growth rate of 16.6% from 2024 to 2032.”⁴

No wonder “experts” and the “McMedia” keep reporting disasters and predict more of them; doom merchants are in dire need of dire emergencies—real, imagined, accidental, or contrived.

The CRTC reports that Canada is partnered with the Windermere Group, a global wealth management company located in Nassau, Bahamas—a tax haven for those who are not fond of taxes or regulations. Online information about the group is scant, and member identities are absent.

Presumably, the group takes its name from Windermere Island, which was once owned by an English Lord and now belongs to the elite’s elite who covet its pink-sand beaches and lavish mansions, not to mention the privacy and gated security—only property owners and invited guests allowed.

Police agencies, military and defence departments—what the CRTC calls the “Coalition of the Willing”—are heavily represented in NG 911. Carbyne, for instance, is an Israeli-American defence contractor busy buying up American emergency call centers; presumably, the same or similar is quietly happening in Canada. Carbyne “develops advanced emergency communications solutions, focuses on providing real-time video, location and data transmission to enhance emergency response systems worldwide.”

Public Safety Canada (PSC) and the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are in collaborative partnership. They’ve “worked with stakeholders to identify priorities for joint work to improve responder communications interoperability.” Stakeholders refers to special interest groups, including mobile carriers—Bell, Rogers, Telus, and many more.

“Stakeholders” connotes public-private partnerships (PPPs). CRTC describes it thus: “high-value data services can be co-developed and financed through shared risk and return models.” In PPP plain speak, corporations “donate” to things like daycares and public parks, and McMedia announces their “philanthropy.”

Deals are struck, the government bestows tax rebates, subsidies and privileges, and the corporation is given the land on which to build massive water-guzzling, energy-sucking AI data centres. Typical of PPPs, taxpayer money disappears, and cost overruns are the norm; corporate law prevents audits. The public part of the “partnership” is negligible.

Enter the World Health Organization (WHO). A revolutionized emergencies response system perfectly dovetails with the Pandemic Treaty agenda. Canada signed on during Justin Trudeau’s tenure. WHO expert James Roguski reports that the treaty’s clandestine motivation is to “secure profits from pathogens with pandemic potential.” That ominous phrase means normalization of biolabs, gain-of-function research and biowarfare.

When the WHO decrees “an emergency of international concern,” (and you know they’re going to) signatory nations will be legally bound to relinquish some rights and sovereignty. Canada’s “health management” has had to upgrade “pandemic readiness.”

New information networks like NG 911 will hook deeply into local communities and funnel data up the chain of command to WHO authorities. They’re called Core Capacities: prevention, surveillance, reporting, notification, verification, preparedness, response, and collaboration.^{5 (Annex 1, 1a)}

Integral to a newer, faster, more reliable NG 911 are GPS and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). GIS captures, stores, processes, and visualizes geographic information. A booster blog writes, “GIS is expected to become even more essential in the NG 9-1-1 system as technology advances.”⁶

A GIS map⁷ resembles the military command posts we see in war movies: detailed topography revealing above-ground and sub-ground infrastructures, millions of lights like fireflies on a dark night, each light representing every single cell phone signal. Instantaneous location awareness and assessment. Currently unavailable and eagerly anticipated, indoor location tracking—soon, they’ll be able to look through walls.

All this new technology has enabled predictive policing (predpol), the crystal balling of potential crime, among other things. It “uses AI and algorithms to analyze historical data, forecasting when and where crimes may occur, or identifying individuals likely to be involved in criminal activity. It aims to increase efficiency and prevent crime, but faces criticism for amplifying racial bias, lacking transparency, and potentially violating privacy, causing some agencies to pause its use.”⁸

Police agencies claim it “helps identify areas at high risk of emergencies and enables proactive measures to be taken.” Rachel Levinson-Waldman, a senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice: “…community organizations are not actively pushing for predictive policing as a preferred way to serve their neighbourhood or community.” Nevertheless, predpol is already being used here.

CRTC documents identified “privacy issues” only once; it was the last item on a short list and received no attention. Natural Resources Canada identified a few problems. “Open data policies exist but are inconsistent and unenforced across jurisdictions.” Open data policies are preferable because then all data is exploitable.

“Weak legal mandates” is another problem—or a boon to brandy snifter lawyers. “Inflexible licensing agreements” is another problem, meaning invest wisely, you could be bound to rigid terms, unable to adapt to market changes or modify how intellectual property is used.

“Few agreements address long-term data stewardship” across the many jurisdictions involved, which sounds like data safety is being sacrificed to data-capitalism.

And this curious item: NRCan identifies the problem of Indigenous data sovereignty being overlooked; “existing policy environment does not adequately account for OCAP® principles [Ownership, Control, Access, and Possession over data collection processes, established by First Nations in 1998] or respect Indigenous communities’ right to govern their data.” Many questions arise, including: Is Indigenous data sovereignty a thing? Why don’t the rest of us have those rights?

Cyber espionage will exploit any and all weaknesses in NG 911. In a March presser, Toronto Police Service caught three Chinese operatives [police were only permitted to say “three males with names sounding like those from mainland China”] driving up and down the streets of Markham, Ontario, in vehicles that were carrying invasive technology—“military-grade hi-tech blaster with a bunch of circuits, a router, and antennas.”

They had the ability to connect to nearby phones and send fraudulent text messages that were professionally engineered, legitimate-looking, and designed to capture personal information, banking credentials and passwords. It’s called “smishing.” By the time police discovered the operation, they’d been at it for months and had gathered at least 13 million contacts.

“When devices are diverted away from legitimate networks,” police said, “it interferes with a person’s ability to connect to emergency services.”

Meanwhile, emergency service providers in our communities are busy doing what they always do. Police are trying to keep the global drug cartels at bay. Fire Services are replacing old hydrants and updating water mains; they’re training and retaining volunteers. Ambulance personnel are attending fentanyl overdoses and rushing people to hospital emergency wards that are open. Search and Rescue is promoting outdoor safety awareness and honing skillsets in dangerous terrain.

They deserve tools that help them save lives—not systems that quietly turn public safety into another pipeline for data extraction, surveillance, and private profit.

1. crtc.gc.ca/eng/phone/911/gen.htm

2. nga911.com/blogs/post/how-ng911-revolutionizing-disaster-management-and-large-scale-emergencies 

3.  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Generation_911

4. ibm.com/think/insights/data-monetization-strategy

5. https://apps.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/WHA77/A77_ACONF14-en.pdf

6. nga911.com/blogs/post/ng911-gis-role-geographic-information-systems-next-generation-911

7.  esri.com/en-us/home

8.  brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/predictive-policing-explained