Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's a pleasure to be with the committee again.
I'm pleased to be joined today by Aaron Snow, the chief executive officer of the Canadian digital service, along with my colleagues from the Communications Security Establishment and Shared Services Canada. After my opening statement, my colleagues and I will be available to answer the committee's questions.
It may be helpful to briefly explain the roles and responsibilities of the office of the chief information officer as they pertain to cybersecurity in the Government of Canada. The office provides strategic direction and leadership in information management, information technology, security, privacy and access to information across the Government of Canada.
We also provide support and guidance on capacity building, project management and oversight across the government. Treasury Board policy instruments outline the roles and responsibilities for GC cybersecurity management and departmental management. Leveraging the policy on government security and the policy on service and digital, we provide strategic direction and oversight.
We define cybersecurity requirements to ensure the Government of Canada and departmental information and data applications, systems and networks are secure, reliable and trusted. During cybersecurity events, TBS will perform strategic coordination, which may include the issuance of strategic direction to departments and agencies on measures to minimize the GC-wide impact.
This is critical work, which is why our office works very closely with the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security and Shared Services Canada to collectively form the Government of Canada IT security tripartite, established to develop and maintain a coordinated and collaborative approach to enterprise IT security. This includes maintaining awareness of the global cyber-threat environment, regularly scanning for new vulnerabilities that may impact government systems and ensuring there is a coordinated response to potential and active threats through the Government of Canada cybersecurity event management plan.
This work has only intensified over the past 14 months. Throughout the pandemic, we have been working very closely with SSC to support government operations by ensuring that secure IT infrastructure and systems continue to enable the delivery of critical federal services. Virtual collaboration was a key element in ensuring the continuity of operations. To enable this, the Government of Canada has had to adjust rapidly, enabling over 290,000 employees and contractors to work securely and remotely, representing a significant increase in remote connections from pre-pandemic levels.
From the early days of the pandemic, TBS, SSC and CSE worked very closely together to address the quickly evolving needs of the GC. Shared Services Canada procured and provisioned new devices and equipment and rapidly deployed new secure cloud-based collaboration and communications systems, while the office of the chief information officer provided resources, advice and guidance to Government of Canada departments, employees and contractors on working remotely securely. During this time, CSE provided ongoing advice on the evolving cyber-threat conditions related to the pandemic. This was to ensure that public servants could continue serving Canadians all while ensuring that the security, privacy and integrity of government information was not compromised.
Another example of collaboration is the work of the Canadian digital service, or CDS, a team within the Treasury Board Secretariat that collaborates with departments to address service delivery challenges. CDS has developed GC Notify, a platform tool that allows departments to quickly and easily push email and text messages to subscribers. When the pandemic started, misinformation was prevalent. CDS, Service Canada and Health Canada came together to use GC Notify to build “Get Updates on COVID-19”, an email service to get people quick and trusted info about COVID-19. Since its launch, the service has securely sent over 5.5 million notifications to subscribers.
Indeed, security has been the priority throughout the pandemic. With so many public servants working from home, we have taken concrete steps to ensure the ongoing security and safety of government networks. We have robust systems in place to monitor, detect and investigate potential cybersecurity threats to information, including new and emerging threats that resulted from working remotely. Safeguards such as enhanced and enterprise secure remote access and digital signature workflows, as well as appropriate policy guidance, have been used to protect information while ensuring employees can continue delivering trusted services and programs to Canadians.
It has also been working to protect the Government of Canada by defending important programs against cyber-threats, including COVID-related benefits, such as the Canada emergency response benefit. The centre is constantly monitoring the security of cloud usage across the Government of Canada and evaluating cloud applications, including for the Public Health Agency of Canada.
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to transform the operational and service landscape of government departments. It has forced us to accelerate digital transformation efforts that were already under way and to move quickly to deliver new services that directly support Canadians. At each step of the way, security has remained at the forefront.
We will remain focused on continuously enhancing cybersecurity in Canada by preparing for all types of cyber incidents and protecting Canadians and their data.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are ready to take the committee's questions.