Canada Scene (canadascene.org), owned and operated by Northern Beacon Media Inc., an Ontario corporation (Ontario Business Registry company number 1003194827), maintains this AI & Automation Policy to govern the responsible use of digital tools in our newsroom. Editor-in-Chief Catherine Roy (catherine.roy@canadascene.org, +1 416 555 0220) holds ultimate responsibility for this policy, which is part of our broader editorial standards. Readers may find full ownership and funding details on our Ownership & Funding page.
Who is responsible for this policy?
Editor-in-Chief Catherine Roy is the senior executive accountable for the AI & Automation Policy at Canada Scene. She oversees all publication decisions, editorial standards, and corrections, and she ensures that every use of digital tools aligns with our journalistic principles.
Northern Beacon Media Inc. (Ontario Business Registry number 1003194827, registered office: Unit 12, 95 King Street East, Toronto, ON M5C 1G4) provides the legal and operational framework. The company’s publisher, along with Catherine Roy, reviews this policy annually and can be contacted through our contact page. Any reader with questions about how we use automation is invited to email complaints@canadascene.org or legal@canadascene.org.
How do AI and automation tools support our work?
Digital tools may assist with research, editing, formatting, translation, metadata creation, headline options, summaries, and transcription. These functions are never used to write full articles or replace human judgment.
For example, a journalist might use an automated transcription service to convert an interview recording into text, saving time while preserving the source’s exact words. An editor may run a headline through a generator to explore alternative phrasings before selecting the best option. In all cases, a named writer, editor, and fact-checker—Andrew Leblanc is our Standards & Fact-Checking Lead—review the final product before publication. Our Fact-Checking Policy and Editorial Policy detail the human oversight embedded in every stage of production. Canada Scene labels any sponsored or commercial material clearly and discloses affiliate links; commercial relationships never determine editorial conclusions.
What is strictly prohibited?
AI must never fabricate quotes, sources, interviews, bylines, author experience, or expert profiles. Canada Scene absolutely forbids the use of generative models to create original news articles, opinion pieces, or investigative reports without substantive human direction and review.
Specifically, the following uses of AI are prohibited: generating content that misrepresents a real person’s words or actions, creating fake bylines or author biographies, producing fabricated sources or statistics, and automating the entire editorial pipeline from research to publication. Any tool that cannot verify the veracity of its output has no place in our fact-checking process. Andrew Leblanc’s team at Standards & Fact-Checking (andrew.leblanc@canadascene.org) is responsible for auditing all uses of AI and ensuring compliance. Violations of this policy may result in immediate disciplinary action. Readers should refer to our Corrections Policy for information on how we handle errors, including those inadvertently introduced by digital tools.
How do we ensure a human guarantee?
Every article published on Canada Scene is drafted by a named writer, reviewed by a named editor, and fact-checked by our dedicated Standards & Fact-Checking Lead, Andrew Leblanc, before it goes live. No content appears on the site without at least one human editor’s approval.
This human guarantee applies to all material, including content that may have been partially assisted by digital tools for research or formatting. The Editor-in-Chief, Catherine Roy, and Managing Editor Marc Tremblay oversee the daily newsroom and ensure that headline review, commissioning, and final approvals are always performed by people. Our editorial team includes Hannah Walsh (Municipal Affairs), Kevin Sullivan (Community & Events), and Jessica Morin (Provincial Affairs), each of whom applies their professional judgment to every piece of content. Full biographies are available on our Our Team page. Readers can verify the byline of any article and contact the writer or editor directly using the email addresses listed on that page.
Our commitments
- We will never publish AI-generated content that has not been reviewed and approved by a human editor with full knowledge of the tool’s role.
- We always verify all quotes, sources, interviews, and factual claims through independent human checks before publication.
- We clearly label any content that was produced with significant AI assistance (e.g., automated transcription or headline generation) in the article metadata or a note to the reader.
- We conduct regular audits of our AI and automation tools to ensure they meet our accuracy, privacy, and ethical standards, reporting findings to the Editor-in-Chief.
- We commit to full transparency about our editorial processes, including this policy, by maintaining publicly accessible pages such as our Editorial Policy, Fact-Checking Policy, and Ownership & Funding.