Information & Ethics Committee on May 21st, 2024

[Bo Basler, Director General and Coordinator, Foreign Interference, Canadian Security Intelligence Service]

I don't have the specifics in terms of whether Liberal Party members were advised on related matters or not. For operational reasons, I can't get into the specifics of what we were or were not investigating at any point in time.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

The current member for Don Valley North ran as a Liberal member. Are you not able to share the reasons for his being monitored by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service with us today for operational reasons?

[Bo Basler]

I can't confirm if we were monitoring or not monitoring any specific individual at a point in time.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Are you aware of open source information through judicial proceedings, public inquiries and reviews of foreign interference that has demonstrated it to be a fact that CSIS was in fact monitoring the member for Don Valley North?

[Bo Basler]

I'm not aware of judicial proceedings that say that, no.

I can't comment further on that. I apologize.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Barrett. That concludes your time.

Mr. Fisher, before we begin, I just want to thank you and your staff for providing a speaking list to us today.

I have Ms. Khalid on that for six minutes.

Go ahead.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank very much, Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for being here today.

I'll start by picking up on something, Ms. Giles, that you said in your opening remarks about providing awareness. How do you provide awareness specifically to MPs, as we are in a more vulnerable position for foreign interference, disinformation, misinformation and being facilitators of information to the general public? What is the role that CSIS plays? How do you deal with MPs?

Over the past number of months, there have been questions around the Leader of the Opposition's refusing to get security clearance so that he can have more access to a lot of this information. How do you deal with those kinds of challenges?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

CSIS plays a variety of roles in terms of both countering foreign interference and raising awareness with the public.

We have a series of public documents that we issue, including the very snappily named “Foreign Interference and You”, which is published in, I believe, seven languages right now. It informs the public, including parliamentarians, on how to identify and protect themselves against foreign interference. As well, we have a 2021 publication on threats to Canada's democracy, which does the same.

We also do a number of civil society engagements to try to build resilience. In 2023 alone, we did over 150. As well, we do security briefings for elected and unelected officials. In 2023, we did over 200 security briefings for both elected and unelected officials, to help build resilience.

The other thing I would add is that we have a number of social media campaigns that try to raise awareness with parliamentarians and Canadians. I have a couple of packages that we were able to print out. It's a bit difficult from X, but I'm happy to share those afterward. Again, it's aimed at helping Canadians and parliamentarians to identify when those actions are happening and how to protect themselves.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Is there a hotline that MPs can call when they feel they are being targeted by a disinformation campaign, perhaps?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

Absolutely. There is a hotline, for ourselves as well as for the Canadian Security Establishment and the Canadian cyber centre. We'll be very happy to provide those to the clerk afterwards.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

How do you balance? Certain diaspora communities are more vulnerable than others when it comes to disinformation, etc. How do you engage with diaspora communities? How do you make sure that the awareness is there in their communities and in a fair and balanced way, without making them feel targeted?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

That's been a major concern and focus for CSIS in the last couple of years. We've really tried to change the channel in terms of how we undertake our engagement with those communities, understanding that the first step is to listen and understand their concerns as well as to ensure that we're communicating in the language of their choice. That's why we've moved to preparing our materials in this space in the languages of the communities that are most targeted by foreign interference. They include Persian, Chinese, Russian, Hindi and others.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thanks for that. I appreciate it. I know that it's a huge challenge as you navigate that space. It must not be an easy thing.

There's another space that I think is really challenging right now, and that's the social media landscape. Perhaps you can help us understand a little about the current climate of partisanship within Canadian politics and within Canada today on a lot of issues on social media. Do you see any correlation between hyperpartisanship and disinformation? What do you do about it?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

What we've seen in terms of the threat landscape relating to foreign interference is that the threat has increased dramatically in terms of both breadth and depth due to technological advances in social media. That has become a very significant part of that.

It's increasingly difficult for individuals to be able to identify the reality of the information that's sitting behind what they see online. That's why we work very carefully across government to ensure that we're able to provide the best possible information to Canadians to allow them to practice good cyber hygiene and to identify when disinformation and misinformation are taking place.

That said, it's certainly not an easy thing to do. It is a bit like pushing a rock up the proverbial hill. The way that we'll be able to counter this is by having all Canadians work together.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

How damaging is it, when you see elected officials, for example, peddling that disinformation and misinformation and using it for partisan gains, in terms of how our communities work together and the gaps that we leave open for foreign interference, for example?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

Making those types of assessments is not something that CSIS evaluates or engages in.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thanks.

CSIS director David Vigneault raised concerns about Canadians' use of TikTok.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Ms. Khalid, can you ask quickly? We're over time.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Absolutely. I'll ask this very quickly. Thank you.

He said, “there is a very clear strategy on the part of the government of China to be able to acquire personal information from anyone around the world.”

How can the government encourage Canadians to take these risks to their security very seriously, especially when it comes to our young people?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Please make it a very brief response.

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

The government undertook an important first step when banning TikTok on government devices. It's a very astute approach, as the director said. We would continue to encourage everyone to be very thoughtful about the personal information they provide to companies.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

That's good advice.

Thank you, Ms. Giles and Ms. Khalid.

Mr. Villemure, you have the floor for six minutes.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our two witnesses for being here with us today.

Ms. Giles, at the beginning of your remarks, you made a distinction between misinformation, disinformation and malinformation. Which do you think is the most common of the three?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

That's an excellent question. There are some pretty clear distinctions in terms of how the threat is assessed. Part of it is related to the goals that are being achieved by the threat actor.

Bo is one of our specialists in this area. I'll ask him to explain it in more detail.

[Bo Basler]

It's important, as well, to recognize that the service isn't monitoring all social media, so we don't have an opinion on all matters of misinformation, disinformation or malinformation that may be spreading on social media or within media ecosystems. The service looks at those instances of disinformation or misinformation that rise to threat the security of Canada. We have a much more narrow and focused look than the entire information ecosystem.