Oh, Canada! Copyright Act Changes Are A Big Win For Right to Repair
With a vote by Parliament (and a nod from King Charles ??!) Canada took a big step ahead of the U.S. as a pro-repair economy. Also: cracked your Pixel 9 Fold's screen? Get your wallet out.
Breaking digital locks without needing the consent of manufacturers is now legal in Canada, thanks to the passage of two new laws in what amounts to the biggest win for repair advocates in North America.
Contents:
Dropped your Pixel 9 Fold? Get your wallet out!
Copyright Office OKs right to repair cars. Will Congress?
Australia announces $900 million fund to promote competition and repair
Apple doesn't want people to upgrade their Mac minis. They do it anyway.
EFF's new Digital Bytes Rights leans into right to repair
Is a day of reckoning looming for John Deere?
Podcast round-up
>> Got a repair complaint? Tell us about it! <<On November 7th, C-244 and C-294 were passed unanimously to allow users to these locks for the purposes of repair and interoperability respectively. The bills amended Canada’s Copyright Act this month - a near carbon copy of the U.S.’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act - allowing circumvention of technological protection measures (TPMs) for the purposes of repair and interoperability.
The changes empower consumers to repair their own devices without breaking the law, tackling TPM restrictions originally meant to combat piracy but later used to monopolize repairs. As noted by TechDirt, independent repair shops will benefit from the increased ability to offer affordable repair services. The bill makes Canada the first country to address digital locks at a federal level in favor of repair access. However, there are limitations. The legal reform don’t grant access to necessary repair tools, which remain restricted from sale or sharing, which could constrain independent repair.
Brandon Vigliarolo writes in The Register, “owners can also make their devices work with third-party components.” Bypassing software locks for the sake of interoperability, better understood as the process of making a product or service work with another product or service, is also now legal.
The bills had support from major industries, including Canada’s Automotive Industries Association, which lobbied for the bill and celebrated its passage - despite its lack of language specific to automotive repair.
What’s driving repair monopolies? Software.
Software has long hampered the ability for users to repair their stuff. Repair restrictions through software are well documented. Downgraded safety features in Tesla’s for using third-party parts or needing to bypass activation locks on Macbooks to make perfectly functional machines work. And issues with interoperability are the reason why printer companies have been able to ban ink cartridges made by their competition through firmware updates. It’s also why Apple’s strategy of making text messages from Androids green instead of the soft blue from other iPhones has lead to 25% of iPhone users saying green texts are a “dating dealbreaker.” Or better yet, leaked information that John Deere Deere could use software updates to downgrade functionality from farmers using unsanctioned GPS products.
Canada takes a big step ahead of the U.S.
Software-driven devices are enabling companies to reach beyond the point of sale and control how, where and how long their products can be used. From cars to tractors and medical devices, larger shares of the objects society relies on need software to function. And that software needs to be updated and maintained over time to ensure the functionality and security of these products. The issue isn’t the software itself, but rather that software can often be a tool to box in consumers from using products in the ways we want. And despite this win in Canada, software controls remain a clear and present danger to the longevity and usability of all our software-driven products.
Compared with the U.S., in which exemptions to the DMCA are limited to specific products or classes of products, require organizations seeking exemptions to pursue a lengthy and expensive legal review process and only last for three years, Canada’s new law creates a big and enduring opening for owner repair.
Lock breaking tools still banned
But problems remain. The largest hole in the law is that companies selling tools to normalize breaking software locks are still banned. That means consumers will have to figure out on their own how to go about bypassing these locks.
Let’s say you are a franchise owner of Tim Horton’s in Canada who is trying to fix a piece of kitchen equipment that has a digital lock preventing your store owners from diagnosing and fixing the problem. Congrats! You are now allowed to break or bypass a software lock—so long as you are doing that for the purpose of repairing your machine. Unfortunately, you’re on your own when it comes to fixing it, because it’s still unlawful in Canada for a company to sell you tools and software that allowing you to bypass these locks. Taylor Machines, which used software locks to mandate franchisees use their authorized repair providers, teamed up with
That’s the reality lived by McDonald’s franchise owners in the U.S., where Taylor Corporation requires owners of its balky McFlurry soft ice cream machines to use its authorized repair providers for any service and repair, resulting in widespread outages across the country, captured by the site McBroken.com.
Kytch, a startup selling a product that allowed McDonald’s franchise owners to maintain and fix McFlurry soft ice cream machines manufactured by the company Taylor, was forced out of business when McDonald’s went to bat for its longtime partner Taylor and declared the Kytch devices “unsafe” for use in its restaurants. A lawsuit filed by Kytch against Taylor and McDonald’s is ongoing.
Without the legal right to sell and distribute tools like the Kytch device, it falls to the device owner to gain the software skills to maintain and fix sophisticated embedded software that runs the machines their business depends on - a big ask.
Canada’s new law doesn’t enable the equivalent of Kytch to open in Canadian markets—hence the skepticism on the true impact of these two new laws.
What does that mean for Canadians? Well, a win is a win. The two newly passed laws in Canada peel back a major legal impediment to owner repair and maintenance of software driven products. Still, the laws will not revolutionize the broader economic and legal system that allows companies to restrict repair through software. There remains much more work to do in both in the U.S. and Canada when it comes to enshrining rights to repair and true interoperability.
😠 Got a repair complaint? Tell us about it!
Do you have a complaint about a manufacturer who is blocking your effort to repair your product? The Repair Coalition wants to hear about it! Use the link below to talk about the repair obstacles you’ve encountered.
Dropped your Pixel 9 Pro Fold? Get ready for a hefty repair bill
Google’s new Pixel 9 Pro Fold is one of the most expensive mobile phones ever sold with a $1,799 price tag. And the high price extends to repair. As the web site Pocket Lint notes: a replacement screen for the new Fold costs $1,200 for parts; with tools, the total is $1,207—comparable to buying a new flagship phone. The site iFixit rates repairing the device as difficult, requiring detailed guidance and precision. The solution? Invest in a sturdy phone case to protect your phone and save you from expensive repairs!
Copyright Office OKs right to repair cars. Will Congress?
The recent, triennial U.S. Copyright Office announcement of exemptions to Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) included good news for car owners: an ruling in favor of a request file by MEMA, The Vehicle Suppliers Association, which represents both original equipment and aftermarket companies. The Copyright Office ruling gives consumers and independent repairers a Class 7 exemption to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), allowing owners and independent repair professionals to circumvent digital locks for the purposes of repair and maintenance.
MEMA and the AutoCare Association said the decision, as well as statements by both the FTC and DOJ lend support to passage of the REPAIR Act, proposed legislation that would create a national right to repair automobiles. MEMA issued a statement noting that the Copyright Office’s decision and other supporting statements “counters automaker arguments that the REPAIR Act would violate copyright and create cybersecurity issues. This builds more support and momentum for the push to pass the REPAIR Act in 2025.”
As noted over at the Car Coalition’s CarRepairChoice.org website, the REPAIR Act (H.R. 906) has more than 55 bipartisan cosponsors in the 118th Congress. “It is essential to enforceable, nationwide standards that ensure safe and fair access to necessary vehicle data,” The Car Coalition wrote.
Australian government announces $900m fund to promote competition (and repair)
Australia has a big problem with the rising cost of living, but has lagged behind both the EU and U.S. in embracing policies to ensure fair pricing for consumers, like right to repair. But that may be about to change. As this article over at The Conversation points out, Treasurer Jim Chalmers announced last week that he will introduce a $900 million (AUS) fund for states and territories to enhance productivity and competition, via economic reforms. According to Chalmers’ plan, states can choose from initiatives like streamlining planning/zoning, adopting modern construction methods, and embracing policies like right to repair that lower prices for consumers and businesses.
“I expect we’ll start by fast-tracking the adoption of trusted international product safety standards and developing a general right to repair – both Commonwealth-led reforms,” Chalmers said. “Both involve small implementation costs but provide significant benefits in the order of $5 billion over the next ten years for product safety, and over $400 million per annum for right to repair.”
Australia appears to be leaning into right to repair. In addition to the news about the $900 million fund to promote productivity (including right to repair) announced by Australia’s Treasurer Jim Chalmers, there are articles like this one at SBS News profiling Lane Cove Repair Café co-founders Wendy Dwyer and Wendy Bishop, who talk about the work they do to keep devices working. Dwyer told SBS news that around two-thirds of the 1,000 items brought to the Lane Cove Repair Café so far this year were mended - an estimated 700 items kept out of landfills.
Apple doesn’t want people to upgrade their Mac Minis. They’re doing it anyway.
As we’ve written, Apple has been celebrated for abandoning its hard stand against owner repair of iPhones in recent months: making parts, tools and repair information more easily available, while also designing its late model phones to be easier to fix. But in other areas of the company’s business, the old regime still reigns. Take the M4 Mac mini, the company’s popular, compact desktop computer that the company sells to the consumer market. Despite their size, Mac mini’s are high performance systems, utilizing Apple’s in-house silicon to gain exceptional power with high efficiency (and therefore, long battery life). Ars Technica calls the latest M4 Mac Mini "Apple's best Mac mini ever." But there’s one problem: Mac Mini’s have hard wired storage: non-removable solid state drives (SSDs) that are often inadequate (256 GB?) for the uses that mini owners have in mind. The SSDs are soldered to the logic board on the devices, presenting a big obstacle for Mac Mini owners who want more storage on their devices. But, as this article points out, those obstacles aren’t impossible to overcome. The article calls out the DIY movement to upgrade Mac Mini’s - in particular the work of YouTuber Colin Mistr (aka dosdude1), who demonstrated in a video last year advanced storage upgrades for an M1 Mac Mini via desoldering and reballing techniques.
Newer versions of the Mac Minis make some movement towards easier to remove storage, but the cost of upgrading is prohibitive. With right to repair laws gaining steam, experts like Mistr are calling on Apple to ditch its restrictive practices like non-removable storage and parts pairing.
EFF’s new Digital Rights Bytes sites trumpets a right to repair
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a widely recognized legal non-profit that advocates for digital rights, is launching a new website focused on explaining conflicts over digital rights. One of their first topics: the right to repair. The new site, Digital Rights Bytes features a post and short video that explores why repairs are costly and how to advocate for repair rights. True ownership of devices requires access to parts and repair info, the EFF says. Its blog post highlights anti competitive practices that are commonplace, including parts “bundling” that makes buying replacement parts needlessly expensive (by only permitting purchases of bundled components), as well as parts pairing - which links specific hardware to removable components.
Is a Day of Reckoning looming for John Deere?
Dave Dickey over at InvestigateMidwest.com wrote an interesting piece documenting the legal walls closing in on ag equipment giant John Deere over the company’s practice of embedding authorization codes in tractor software, blocking farmers from conducting even simple repairs for expensive and mission critical farm equipment. Under Deere’s regime, only its authorized dealers have access to these codes, leaving farmers at the mercy of John Deere dealerships to keep their farms running. In 2023, Deere and other manufacturers signed MOUs with the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), promising access to manuals, software, and tools for independent repairs. In exchange, AFBF agreed not to push for right-to-repair laws. More than a year later, however, farmers and legal experts argue the agreements have not delivered the promised access to farmers and fail to grant full repair rights, maintaining Deere’s control and limiting farmers’ autonomy. Farmers feel betrayed, viewing Deere’s practices as a money-driven monopoly.
That has led to legal troubles for Deere, Dickey points out. Earlier this year, a U.S. District Judge allowed class action antitrust litigation against Deere alleging Deere’s monopoly profits stem from blocking repair access to proceed. Key upcoming steps include class certification arguments in 2025, with a trial possibly extending into 2026. More recently, it was revealed in a court filing that the FTC is investigating Deere’s restrictions. In the meantime, Deere’s tractor sales are slumping - possibly indicating customer dissatisfaction amidst growing outrage.
One option Dickey raises: competition. What if a Deere competitor provides genuine right-to-repair options? Such a company could attract farmers loyal to Deere’s green brand, potentially reshaping the market for farm equipment. It’s an interesting piece. Check it out!
Podcast Round-up
We noticed a couple podcasts this week that delved into the right to repair. They include:
Texas Public Policy Foundation interviews PIRG’s Nathan Proctor
Divided We Podcast talks right to repair
The United We Stand, Divided We Stand podcast took on the issue of right to repair issue. Check out their conversation below!