OIATC Ontario Indigenous AI & Technology Council Indigenous digital sovereignty in Ontario
Who we are

About OIATC

The Council exists so Indigenous Nations, communities, and organizations across Ontario can govern AI and digital systems on their own terms.

Russell Jones
Founder

Russell Jones

Ojibwe from Sagamok Anishnawbek · Founder / Platform Steward

Russell Jones is building OIATC to ensure Indigenous Peoples in Ontario are not reduced to passive recipients of AI systems, digital platforms, and governance models designed elsewhere.

His work sits at the intersection of platform engineering, deployment infrastructure, digital governance, and long-term stewardship. The Council is being formed to make those disciplines answer to Indigenous law, protocol, consent, and cultural continuity rather than vendor agendas.

OIATC is intended to outlast any single project. Waaseyaa, Minoo, and related platforms are part of the technical substrate, but the larger work is institutional: building an Ontario-wide council capable of guiding Indigenous digital futures on principled terms.

Purpose

Protect Indigenous sovereignty in the age of AI, build community-owned digital capacity, and establish governance frameworks rooted in Indigenous law and protocol.

Relationship to Nations

OIATC serves all Indigenous Nations in Ontario through consent-based relationships. Nations retain authority over their data, systems, governance decisions, and cultural protocols.

Infrastructure Partner

Web Networks

Non-profit worker co-op · Founded 1987 · One of Canada's first ISPs · All infrastructure on Canadian soil

Indigenous data sovereignty starts with where data physically lives. OIATC's infrastructure is hosted through Web Networks in Toronto, on Canadian-owned, open-source systems with no foreign cloud dependencies. The long-term vision is to build infrastructure on First Nations land. Until that's possible, Web Networks provides the foundation: 38 years of serving non-profits, governments, and Indigenous institutions, including the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut and Nunavut Public Library Services.

Read the founding charter for principles, mandate, and governance commitments.