Tier 1: Universal Rules
Draft
These are draft guidelines that have not been finalized, and are pending further community discussion.
These rules apply to all users on all Fedecan platforms.
Prohibited by Canadian Law
Governance & Updates for this section
We operate out of Canada and are subject to Canadian law. This includes the Criminal Code of Canada, and other relevant federal and provincial legislation.
While changes to these rules are rare and require careful consideration, we welcome community discussion on how to strengthen and clarify them. Many of our users are Canadians who value a safe and healthy online community, and advocate for the rules that they want to see.
Rule 1: Violence and Threats
We do not allow threats of death or bodily harm to a person, or threats to burn, destroy, or damage property. We do not allow content that counsels or facilitates violent acts, or content that incites violence or promotes violent extremism or terrorism.
This is based on whether a reasonable person would interpret the statement as a serious expression of intent to cause harm. Obvious hyperbole and satire are evaluated by the same reasonable person standard.
Rule 2: Hate and Discrimination
We do not allow statements that incite or promote hatred against an identifiable group, as defined in the Criminal Code of Canada.
In this section, identifiable group means any section of the public distinguished by colour, race, religion, national or ethnic origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or mental or physical disability.
We extend this definition to include any group that a reasonable person would recognize as a target of hatred, consistent with the intent of the law. Disagreement and sharp criticism of someone's actions or beliefs are not covered by this rule, as this rule looks for content that targets people based on identity rather than as an individual.
We do not allow content that promotes or endorses hateful ideologies, including racial or religious supremacism, ethnonationalism, genocidal ideology and denialism, and gender-based hate movements. This includes Nazism, neo-Nazism, white nationalism, fascism, Antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism, Holocaust denialism, residential school denialism, anti-LGBTQ+ hate, and transphobia. The absence of a specific item from this list does not mean it is permitted.
Rule 3: Child Safety
We do not allow child sexual abuse material (CSAM) in any form, whether that is images, video, text, or AI-generated content. We do not allow any sexual content involving persons under 18, nor content that sexualizes minors, even where it does not meet the technical definition of CSAM, including suggestive imagery, grooming-adjacent behaviour, and content that targets minors inappropriately.
Rule 4: Non-Consensual Intimate Imagery
We do not allow publishing, distributing, transmitting, selling, or making available an intimate image of a person without their consent. This includes AI-generated intimate imagery of real people, commonly known as deepfakes.
Prohibited by Fedecan Policy
Rule 5: Privacy and Dignity
We do not allow sharing private or personally identifiable information about an individual without their consent if it can facilitate harm. This includes contact information, home or workplace details, or connecting someone's pseudonymous identity to their real identity.
Speculation in the aftermath of an incident
Do not name individuals as accused perpetrators or victims before identification by law enforcement or credible media sources. If you have information about an incident, contact the relevant authorities directly rather than posting publicly.
Raising awareness about someone's conduct
Content about public figures from reliable sources is generally permitted. Accusations and similar content will require high-quality sourcing and must be factual. If you believe someone is engaging in harmful or illegal behaviour, contacting a relevant organization or platform moderators is often more effective than making a public post.
Rule 6: Targeted Harassment
We do not allow patterns of behaviour directed at a specific person intended to intimidate, silence, or cause distress. This includes:
- Dogpiling or coordinated attacks against an individual
- Continued engagement after being asked to stop
- Sustained campaigns to intimidate or silence someone
- Contacting someone online or in real life to confront or harass them, whether or not they use Fedecan platforms
Rule 7: Fraud and Deception
We do not allow scams, phishing attempts, and content designed to defraud users. We do not allow impersonation of individuals or entities in a misleading way. Satire or parody accounts must be clearly identified as such in their profile.
Rule 8: Harmful Content
We do not allow content that poses an imminent risk of physical harm to real people. This includes content that encourages, instructs, or promotes dangerous activities such as self-harm, or suicide. The test is whether a reasonable person would interpret the content as encouraging dangerous behaviour, regardless of the poster's intent.
Rule 9: Misinformation and Disinformation
This section is a placeholder.
This rule needs further community input. The contents below are intended as a starting point for discussion.
We do not give equal visibility to claims that contradict established factual consensus in cases where doing so could cause harm.
Dangerous Health Misinformation
In line with rule 8, we remove false claims about medical treatments or public health that contradict expert consensus and could lead to physical harm. This includes the promotion of unproven cancer cures, discouraging vaccination against serious diseases, or claiming a harmful substance is safe to ingest.
Election and Civic Integrity
We remove content designed to mislead people about civic processes or undermine election integrity. This includes false information about voting dates, locations, or eligibility requirements.
We will base these decisions on documentation and fact sheets from official organizations, when such resources are made available. For example, the ElectoFacts resource by Elections Canada.
Content with Specific Handling
This content must be labelled, flagged, or handled in a way that allows users to control what they see.
Rule 10: Sensitive Content Labelling
Content that is permitted but may be sensitive or not safe for work must be labelled using the platform's available sensitivity tools. Use the strongest available flag that matches the content. When in doubt, add a label. For example:
- Graphic content includes depictions of violence, gore, medical procedures, injuries, bodily functions, war footage and conflict journalism. If the average person would not want to see this on their screen without warning, it should be labelled.
- Sexual content includes explicit or suggestive sexual content. See rule 3 for content that is prohibited.
- Mental health discussions that touch on self-harm, suicidal ideation, or eating disorders should carry a warning or a label.
Do not use sensitive content in your avatar or banner. When embedding sensitive images in comments or posts where the platform does not automatically hide them, use the platform's spoiler or content-hiding tools. When linking to sensitive content, you should label the link.
Platform-specific labelling instructions are defined in Tier 2.
Rule 11: AI-Generated and Automated Content
This section is a placeholder.
This rule needs further community input. The contents below are intended as a starting point for discussion.
Content that was created with the help of generative AI tools should be labelled. Automated accounts must identify themselves as bots in their profile. Bot operators are responsible for their bot's actions and must comply with all platform rules. See rule 7 for information on fraud and deception.
Other Account Conduct
Rule 12: Moderation Circumvention
If a moderator or admin has taken action on your content or account, do not circumvent that action. This includes using alternate accounts or creating new accounts to evade bans, reposting removed content, and similar actions.
Rule 13: Platform Integrity
We do not allow automated scraping of user content. We do not allow attempts to hack, DDoS, or otherwise compromise Fedecan systems or infrastructure.
If you are working on a project that might interact with Fedecan platforms in an automated way, we are happy to discuss your project with you and may suggest alternative techniques to limit harm.