In a recent development, Google Maps has updated its labels to show “Lake America,” a change that has caught the attention of U.S. President Donald Trump, who is now urging Apple to do the same by including the new label on every iPhone’s preinstalled navigation app.
Experts in the tech industry point out a concerning reality for many Canadian consumers and businesses, emphasizing that they are heavily reliant on American-owned platforms with limited non-American alternatives available.
Anne Pasek, Canada Research Chair in Media, Culture and the Environment at Trent University, highlighted the significant influence of American tech monopolies on Canadians’ digital lives and overall jurisdiction, which often goes unnoticed until controversies arise.
Several Canadian websites, including federal government portals and major banks, have recently showcased maps where Lake Ontario has been renamed as Lake America. This adjustment follows an executive order issued by President Trump as part of ongoing trade disputes.
Google has implemented the change for U.S. users and provided an option for non-American websites to display the original name, “Lake Ontario,” by customizing their maps to reflect the Canadian region.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum mentioned that Trump reached out to Apple to request the label change, but Apple has yet to respond to inquiries for comment.
Beyond offering navigation services to millions of users, mapping tools from prominent U.S. tech companies play a crucial role in the operations of numerous Canadian businesses, providing essential information such as hours of operation and contact details, as well as supporting functionalities like address autocomplete for e-commerce sites and traffic monitoring for transport and delivery apps.
Emily Osborne, a policy research associate at the Canadian Shield Institute, emphasized the reliance on American tech companies for various digital services and products, including navigation. She suggested Dutch companies TomTom and HERE Technologies as potential alternatives to Google and Apple in the navigation sector.
Osborne expressed concerns that escalating tensions between Canada and the U.S. could lead the Trump administration to target other tech-related aspects to exert pressure, such as payment processing and cloud storage, which could significantly impact Canadian businesses relying on U.S.-owned digital infrastructure.
The recent AWS outage serves as a reminder of the vulnerabilities faced by Canadian businesses dependent on American digital services, especially in scenarios where government intervention may restrict access, as highlighted by Osborne.
She underscored the lack of Canadian alternatives in critical areas such as credit card payment processing, currently dominated by Visa and MasterCard, raising the need for diversified options to ensure Canadian businesses’ resilience in the face of potential disruptions.