Kent Walker, Google’s president of global affairs, said in a press release Thursday that the law “remains unworkable.”
He said the company to made the “difficult decision” to remove links to Canadian news from Google Search, Google News and other products in Canada when the law goes into effect.
Walker argued that the Online News Act “creates uncertainty for our products and exposes us to uncapped financial liability simply for facilitating Canadians’ access to news from Canadian publishers.”
News outlets have seen revenue from ad sales and subscriptions fall as big tech companies dominate online news distribution and advertising.
Supporters of the Canadian law and similar U.S. efforts say these measures are essential to protecting sources of reliable news that tech companies rely on for users.
Google’s move is the latest instance of a major technology company fighting back against laws meant to help news outlets stay afloat.
Meta also said last week that it would follow through on its plans to block news content Facebook and Instagram in Canada over the new law.
Meta made similar threats in response to a California measure, the Journalism Preservation Act, which passed the state assembly earlier this month.
The Hill’s Julia Shapero has more here.
