Internet and Social Media

The news on the coronavirus are dominating our newscasts so much that many other stories are being neglected. That’s natural. But some stories, like Waterfront Toronto’s relationship with Google sister company, Sidewalk Labs, planning the Toronto waterfront “smart city” project, were being neglected for many months before the virus struck.

The Google-affiliated American company Sidewalk Labs’ 1500-page proposal for a smart city on Toronto’s eastern waterfront has received plenty of criticism since its release in late June.

On June 24, Sidewalk Labs, a sister company to Google, released its three-volume, 1,500-page Master Innovation and Development Plan (MIDP) containing its draft proposals for a smart-city project in Toronto. This post focuses Sidewalk Labs’ discussion of “Creating a Trusted Process for Responsible Data Use” (Part 3 of a chapter on “Digital Innovation” -- Volume 2, Chapter 5--) (Volume 2, Chapter 5. Part 3 proposes the use of a “civic data trust” to govern the “urban data” generated within the proposed smart city project area.