Canada · 14 d ago
A First Nation in Ontario builds its own data centre to protect its heritage
Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory
Manitoulin Island, Ontario
The Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory, on Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron, installed a small data centre last year that holds video recordings of Anishinaabe speaking their language.
The purpose of all of this is having the ownership, access, control and possession of our information.
— Tim Ominika, Wiikwemkoong chief
Why now
A flood in 2022 cost the community of about 4,000 some of its digital records, and it is now moving all its data out of a Microsoft data centre in Toronto.
And us?
It is believed to be the only data centre on Indigenous territory in Canada, and delegations from other communities in Ontario and Manitoba have come to see it.
