Social media platforms will be able to obtain an exemption if they have put in place sufficient safeguards.

Platforms that offer adult content would not be able to obtain that exemption. The bill covers adult content services that focus on user-shared content.

Bill C-34, introduced Wednesday in the House of Commons, doesn't prescribe a specific method to verify age, officials said at a background briefing.

The bill would also regulate the companies behind AI chatbots by imposing on them a duty to act responsibly.

That includes measures to lower the risk of chatbots communicating harmful content and putting in place crisis intervention protocols for cases involving self-harm, suicide or violence.

The legislation would create a new regulator, the Digital Safety Commission of Canada. The government said in briefing materials it would be an independent body whose members would be appointed by cabinet.

The bill covers seven types of harmful content, including content that induces a child to harm themselves, content that incites violence and foments hatred and non-consensual intimate content.

Social media platforms will have to remove two types of content within 24 hours — content that sexually victimizes a child or revictimizes a survivor and non-consensual intimate images. 

Platforms will also have to "apply labels to synthetically generated content," the government said in a press release.

"While laws exist to respond once harm has happened, there is currently very little that requires online services to prevent harm in the first place," the release said.

"The Safe Social Media Act aims to change that by ensuring that social media services and artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots are responsible for addressing harm before it occurs."

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