Information & Ethics Committee on May 9th, 2022

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Can you explain to me why all the major federal privacy institutions find this to be surveillance, but not the RCMP?

How is it that everyone but the RCMP is wrong on this issue?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

I have never seen any examples of the RCMP using it for mass surveillance at all.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

So you are saying that the Privacy Commissioner is wrong and has misled Canadians. Is that what you are saying?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

I'm saying that we would never use it for mass surveillance.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Chair, on a point of order.

As a parliamentarian, I ask questions and I am very annoyed by the fact that an RCMP official comes here and does not answer questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

That's not really a point of order. I hear your statement, but I don't see a point of order there.

With that, it is time for Mr. Green for two and a half minutes.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Just on that point of order, Mr. Chair—

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Mr. Bezan, I ruled that it wasn't a point of order, but if you have a point of order—

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Well, it is a point of order, because I do believe that if you look at our rules of procedure in Bosc and Gagnon in chapter 20, there is an expectation put upon the witnesses who appear before a committee to answer all questions put by committee members, fully and truthfully. I do see that some of the answers we are receiving today have been very much limited. I would suggest that witnesses should exercise their responsibilities to this committee, and that those of us around the table have parliamentary privilege and do expect complete answers. Giving one-word answers and being dodgy is not fulfilling the work of the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

It's noted, Mr. Bezan. I, as the chair, don't want to be in the position of judging the responses that come from our witnesses. You are absolutely correct that witnesses do have an obligation, when they appear at our committee, to be truthful and to answer to the best of their abilities. I don't want to get into a debate about the quality of the answers as chair, but your point is noted.

I see that Ms. Khalid has a point on the same point. Go ahead.

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

Thank you, Chair.

I just want to remind members of the committee that you have ruled on this point of order that it's not really a point of order. When we have found the answers of witnesses to be lacking in the past, we've invited them to provide further responses in writing. I think that we should do the same in this instance and not really get bogged down in the minutiae of it right now, and rather continue with our questioning.

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

Thank you, Ms. Khalid.

Of course, members are always free to, if necessary, move for specific answers if they are looking for them.

With that, where were we? We were about to begin Mr. Green's round of two and a half minutes.

Go ahead, Mr. Green.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much. I will get into specificity.

I think what we're seeing here, Mr. Chair, is a huge gap between the way in which the RCMP views its role in public safety and the way in which our committee, as an elected civil society group, views its role. I want to get specific, because the language does matter when we talk about things like mass surveillance, and that's why I can appreciate my colleague's frustration that the answers have not sufficed.

In the investigation of the RCMP's use of Clearview AI, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner found that the company's technology allowed law enforcement to match photographs to a database of three billion images scraped from the Internet—three billion.

Mr. Sage, would you not agree that three billion images would constitute, quite rightly, mass surveillance?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

We have never searched mass surveillance.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, this is, again, what our public safety institution is doing indirectly when it cannot do it directly. Clearview AI's technology is used to identify people by matching photographs against their database of three billion images. That's just a fact.

In fact, according to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, only 6% of the searches recorded by Clearview appear linked to NCECC victim identification, and approximately 85% are not accounted for at all by the RCMP.

Given this context, what was the purpose of the RCMP's staff who conducted these searches? Would you not agree that with a 6% hit rate and 85% unaccountability, that would constitute mass surveillance and an unlawful and unwarranted gathering of information against the general public?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

The 6% used were the actual three files I spoke of. The 85% were used to test the program. The members in the NCECC tested this process on themselves as—

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

But isn't testing it a surreptitious gathering of information?

Let me ask one last question, Mr. Chair. With respect to the practice of street checks and racial profiling—the analog version of this, which the RCMP is still, at least to my knowledge, using actively across the country—at least that process would have some framework of accountability. Is it your testimony here today that in “testing” this, you can use that phrase to perhaps justify the gathering of this information without legal frameworks?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

When we test the system, it's on our members and using celebrities who are on the Internet. It was never, and has not been, used for mass surveillance.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

There were three billion images of your members and celebrities—three billion?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

We put a very tight restriction on who can use it and for what purposes. It was in the—

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Were those restrictions on Clearview?

[The Chair, Conservative, Pat Kelly]

We are over the time with Mr. Green's round, so now I'm going to go to Mr. Kurek. If you wish to split your time, just let me know.

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

As a point of clarification to our witnesses, there's been some request for further information, so I would simply ask—and I hope with the agreement of other members of the committee—that the documents that have been asked for be provided by June 1. I think that would be a very reasonable request.

Director Sage, could you describe for me Project Arachnid? Do you have any involvement in that? I note on their website that it specifically states, “Project Arachnid does not use or rely upon facial recognition technology. It uses hashing technology — which is technology that assists in matching a particular image or video against a database of known child sexual abuse material.”

Mr. Sage, could you outline your familiarity with Project Arachnid and explain exactly what it is?

[C/Supt Gordon Sage]

Yes, I am aware of it. It's a program that CCCP runs out of Winnipeg for the child exploitation centre there. It is not using facial recognition technology, and I confirmed that with the director of their program. They use a hashtag search, which generally is the DNA of a photograph. It crawls the Internet based on the DNA of that image. When you have an image, it creates a hashtag and it is based on that. They do not use facial recognition technology at all.

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Thank you very much.

Certainly I think it's this committee's wish to find that right balance to make sure that law enforcement has the tools needed to deal with those who commit heinous crimes, while ensuring that the rights of Canadians are respected and that challenges with racial bias and things like FRT are called out.

I would ask this question, as well, to our witness from the Toronto Police Service. Are you aware of Project Arachnid, and has that been used with any Toronto Police Service investigations?