One year after Moffatt v. Air Canada, 2024 BCCRT 149, the decision looks less like a narrow consumer dispute and more like an early marker of how Canadian law will treat agentic AI. The Tribunal’s conclusion that Air Canada was fully responsible for its chatbot’s assurances aligns with today’s reality that organizations are deploying increasingly autonomous systems whose outputs can meaningfully affect rights, expectations, and financial consequences.

A parallel development appears in the Ontario IPC’s Privacy Complaint PI21-0001 (2024), involving McMaster University’s use of automated exam-proctoring technology. In that case, the Commissioner found that institutions remain accountable for the consequences of automated systems, particularly when those systems operate opaquely or produce outcomes users cannot meaningfully challenge. The IPC emphasized that adopting or outsourcing digital tools does not displace the organization’s duties under privacy law. Together with Moffatt, the IPC’s findings highlight a growing public-interest concern that automated interfaces can deepen the asymmetry between institutional power and user understanding.

Viewed together, these decisions anticipate a rule that is becoming central to contemporary digital governance, which is that when institutions automate their voice or their decisions, they remain fully responsible for what those systems say, imply, or do. Moffatt continues to resonate because it grounds this principle early, at precisely the moment when AI agents are poised to take on a far greater share of institutional communication and decision-making.