June 7, 2026Welcome to Letters from CAMP, a newsletter on anti-monopoly activity in Canada and abroad, brought to you by the Canadian Anti-Monopoly Project. In this instalment we have:
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New CAMP Report Shines a Light on the Cloud Computing Oligopoly and What to Do About ItNot so long ago, businesses and governments would maintain their own IT infrastructure, keeping physical banks of servers and hardware on their own premises. Today, the landscape looks dramatically different. Cloud computing, the outsourcing of computing infrastructure to specialized providers, is now the predominant IT backbone of business and government for all but the most sensitive data. This phenomenon is only set to intensify as AI supercharges demand for flexible and large-scale computing workloads. The only problem? The current cloud computing market is three American companies in a trench coat. In our new report, Parting Clouds, CAMP tackles head on the issue of a concentrated cloud computing market. Businesses and governments depend on these services to function smoothly. But the concentration of this market has created economic and geopolitical vulnerabilities. Countries are now reconsidering the arrangement that put massive economic infrastructure in the hands of companies headquartered in an increasingly erratic country. But breaking out is no simple task. The scale and flexibility of U.S. cloud computing companies cannot easily be matched, and clients looking to leave face a wall of lock-in, opaque contracts, and predatory deals To make competition work in the market for cloud computing, Canadian policy makers need to put interoperability at the heart of their procurement, regulatory, and competition law enforcement actions. Rather than trying to force alternatives into existence, Canada, along with other middle power and unaligned nations, can create the conditions for challengers to the cloud oligopoly to emerge and thrive. The timing couldn’t be more apt: dependable and accessible compute is a cornerstone of the federal government’s recently released AI for All strategy. By working with allies to create a more competitive cloud market, Canada can reinforce the digital foundation of our economy in an increasingly volatile world. 📰 CAMP in the News 📰
Online Advertising Data Puts Members of the Military at RiskThe design of the modern online advertising market means that for a nominal fee, anyone can construct a highly detailed picture of an individual, including their near real-time location. For the average person, this is at best a creepy realization. But for individuals working in high security fields like the military, the potential for danger is much higher. This week, Reuters reported on a letter from Senator Ron Wyden detailing that U.S. military personnel were being tracked and targeted using this very data by adversaries of the U.S.. This risk is not new to policy makers. Civil society organizations, including CAMP , have pointed out that nearly every individual is vulnerable to abuse flowing from the persistent commercial surveillance system we built up around ourselves. Without proper privacy laws, precise location data is both a massive privacy issue and a threat to national security. While recent reporting focuses on U.S. soldiers, there’s nothing stopping an adversary from engaging in the same conduct against members of the Canadian armed forces or security establishment. While vendors often claim data is properly anonymized, as soon as patterns of behaviour can be tied to location it is trivial to identify an individual and find out where they live, work, and relax. This task becomes even easier as AI brings down the cost and complexity of synthesizing large volumes data. While militaries may attempt to lock down government devices, the problem will persist so long as this information is commercially available. Canada and our allies need robust privacy laws that ban the collection and use of this data if we want to keep safe those who face the highest risk. 📚 What We’re Reading 📚
Avoiding a Capital MonopolyLate last month it was announced that TMX, Canada’s largest stock exchange operator, proposed to acquire Cboe’s equities exchanges in Australia and Canada. The takeover is being pitched by the purchaser as a chance to offer Canadian companies simplicity and greater reach into capital markets. But in a piece for the Globe this week, University of Calgary Business School Associate Dean Ari Pandes lays out how the acquisition could mean less competition, higher prices, and worse service in an important channel of capital. After the deal, Canada would have a single exchange operator with over 90% of the listing market, putting the transaction well into the danger zone of Canada’s newly strengthened merger laws. As Pandes argues, the transaction would be a step backwards as we try to make our economy more competitive, productive, and appealing as a market for companies to grow. To preserve competition in the market that determines whether challengers can emerge across the economy, the Competition Bureau must act decisively and block TMX’s acquisition of Cboe’s Canadian operations. If you have any monopoly tips or stories you’d like to share, drop us a line at hello@antimonopoly.ca
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