Information & Ethics Committee on May 28th, 2019

[Ian Lucas]

For transferring data....

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

We're at time, so I have to move on to the next questioner, who is Mr. Lawless from Ireland.

[James Lawless, Member, Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Houses of the Oireachtas]

Mr. Chair, thanks for including us here today. I'm glad to be here.

We've had engagement, obviously, at our Irish committee with the companies and we met Mr. Zuckerberg in Dublin recently.

I have to say that I welcome the engagement of the representatives from the tech companies that are here, but I do find extraordinary some of the statements that have been made, such as the statement made by Mr. Potts a few minutes ago that he wasn't familiar with the parliamentary procedure, and that was maybe to explain some gap in the evidence.

I also find it extraordinary that some of the witnesses are unfamiliar with previous hearings and previous discourse on these matters in all of our parliaments. I would have thought that was a basic prerequisite before you entered the room, if you were qualified to do the job. I caveat my questions with that. It is disappointing. I want to put that on record.

Moving on to the specifics, we've heard a lot of words, some positive words, some words that are quite encouraging if we were to believe them, both today and previously, from the executive down. However, I suppose actions speak louder than words—that's my philosophy. We heard a lot today already about the Cambridge Analytica-Kogan scandal. It's worth, again, putting on record that the Irish data protection commissioner actually identified that in 2014 and put Facebook on notice. However, I understand that it wasn't actually followed up. I think it was some two or three years, certainly, before anything was actually done. All that unfolded since could have been avoided, potentially, had that actually been taken and followed up on at the time.

I'm following that again to just, I suppose, test the mettle of actions rather than words. These first few questions are targeted to Facebook.

We heard Mr. Zuckerberg say in public, and we heard again from witnesses here today, that the GDPR is a potential gold standard, that the GDPR would be a good model data management framework and could potentially be rolled out worldwide. I think that makes a lot of sense. I agree. I was on the committee that implemented that in Irish law, and I can see the benefits.

If that is so, why is it that Facebook repatriated 1.5 billion datasets out of the Irish data servers the night before the GDPR went live? Effectively, we have a situation where a huge tranche of Facebook's data worldwide was housed within the Irish jurisdiction because that's the EU jurisdiction, and on the eve of the enactment of GDPR—when, of course, GDPR would have become applicable—1.5 billion datasets were taken out of that loop and repatriated back to the States. It doesn't seem to be a gesture of good faith.

Perhaps we'll start with that question, and then we'll move on if we have time.

[Kevin Chan]

Thank you very much, sir.

I very much agree with you that actions speak louder than words. I think that, to the degree that we need to demonstrate that, we will be working in the coming months and in the coming years through our actions to demonstrate that we intend to keep our service secure and the privacy of individuals safe, and that we intend to do the right thing.

In terms of what you mentioned with respect to the transfer.... Again—full declaration—I am not a lawyer, but I understand that's consistent with our terms of service.

[James Lawless]

It's consistent, but it's also incredibly convenient that it was on the night before the GDPR became effective.

I'll ask another question in the same vein. My understanding is that Facebook is continuing to appeal a number of decisions. The U.K. information commissioner had a negative finding against Facebook recently, which Facebook is appealing. My colleague, Hildegarde Naughton, has talked about the Irish data protection commissioner's findings.

If you're putting your hands up and saying, “We got some things wrong”, and demonstrating good faith, which I would welcome if that were the case, why are you continuing to appeal many of these decisions?

[Kevin Chan]

There are instances.... Because they are subject to court processes, there are limits to what I think we can say today. As you are probably aware, we are trying very hard to arrive at resolutions on other open matters. I think that I would urge you to observe our actions as we can make them public through these processes and make a determination at that time.

[James Lawless]

I just have a very quick question for Google.

I understand that Google's approach has been to not run political advertising at all, certainly in the Canadian context. We saw a similar decision in Ireland during the abortion referendum a year ago. I have concerns about that decision because I think that it allows malevolent actors to take the stage in terms of misinformation that's not targeted. I think that perhaps it's actually more bona fide to have political actors be transparent and run ads in a legitimate, verified context.

I'm just concerned about that, and I hope that's not going to be long term. Maybe that's an interim move.

[Colin McKay]

With the few seconds we have left, I have an observation. Both in Ireland and in Canada, we found ourselves in a position where we were seeing uncertainty in what we could guarantee to the electorate. We wanted to make sure we had a strict framework around how we were serving advertising and recognizing our responsibilities. As my colleague mentioned earlier, a goal of ours moving forward is that we have the tools in place so that, whether it's a question of ambiguity or malevolent actors, there is transparency for users and it's done in a clear and consistent way across all our products.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

Thank you, Mr. Lawless.

We'll go into our next round now.

Go ahead, Singapore.

[Sun Xueling, Senior Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of National Development, Parliament of Singapore]

I would like to come back to the example of Sri Lanka, with Mr. Neil Potts.

Mr. Potts said earlier that he was not aware that the incendiary videos had been sent up to Facebook. I would like to highlight that in an article in The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Hilmy Ahamed, vice-president of the Muslim Council of Sri Lanka, said that Muslim leaders had flagged Hashim's inflammatory videos to Facebook and YouTube using the services that were built into your reporting system.

Can I just confirm with Mr. Potts that if you were aware of these videos, Facebook would have removed them?

[Neil Potts]

Yes, ma'am. That's correct. If we are aware, we would remove the videos. With this specific case, I don't have the data in front of me to ensure we were put on notice, but if we were aware, these videos would have been removed.

[Sun Xueling]

Thank you.

Similarly, can I then confirm in the same spirit that if Facebook were aware of a video being falsified—and we discussed the case of Nancy Pelosi earlier—Facebook would then carry a clarification that they are aware the video is falsified?

[Neil Potts]

When one of our third party, fact-checking partners.... We have over 50 now who are international, global and that adhere to the Poynter principles. They would rate that as being false. We would then put up the disclaimer. We would also aggressively reduce that type of information and also signal to users who are not only engaging with it but trying to share, or have shared, that it has been rated false.

[Sun Xueling]

Your disclaimer would actually say that you understand that the information contained is false.

[Neil Potts]

It would have a link or a header to the article from one of the fact-checkers that disputes and claims it is false.

[Sun Xueling]

This would be circulated to all who would have seen the original video.

[Neil Potts]

If you are engaging with it currently, you would see it, whether at the bottom in your newsfeed or perhaps on the side if you are on desktop. If you have shared it, you would be informed that there has been an action disputing the validity of the content.

[Sun Xueling]

Mr. Chan, previously you had talked about Facebook putting friction into the system. Can I then confirm with you that Facebook is committed to cutting out foreign interference in political activities and elections, and that you would actively put friction into the system to ensure that such foreign interference is weeded out?

[Kevin Chan]

I suspect you're asking about potential legislation in Singapore. You would be well served to look at the Elections Modernization Act that Canada put in place—

[Sun Xueling]

My question was quite specific. I wanted you to confirm what you said earlier, that you are putting “friction” into the system. You specifically used that term.

[Kevin Chan]

Parliament has given us great guidance and we have decided to put friction into the system. We would recommend that the Canadian model be something that you consider as you develop legislation elsewhere.

[Sun Xueling]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

We've gone through just about all the delegates. We're going to go back to the U.K. for another kick. You didn't have to share your time, so we're going to give you some more time.

We're going to go to Mr. Erskine-Smith, and I think Mr. Angus has another question. Ms. Stevens...again, and then I think we've completed everybody.

As chair, I'm going to try to give everybody a five-minute turn. Once we have gone through everybody, we have David to follow the sequence. Then we'll look at second questions in second five-minute times, so if you wish to ask another question, please let the chair know, and I'll try to put them in priority.

Next up, we have Mr. Erskine-Smith.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thank you very much.

I just want to pick up where I left off with Google. Would you support a competition framework that includes privacy in the competition commissioner's purview?

[Colin McKay]

We have two regulatory mechanisms in Canada, one for competition and one for data protection. This was highlighted in the government's recent digital charter. They've both been identified for review over the next year and that's a process where I think we can discuss that balance.