Good morning, colleagues.
On the morning of Thursday, April 25 of this year, I received an urgent message from my colleague indicating the necessity of a call as soon as possible. I was not alone on the thread, so the call was set for later that afternoon. The contents, once shared, were disturbing. Those present on the call had been the target of a cyber-attack by APT31, which is a hacker group set up by the PRC.
To receive this news is unsettling, to say the least. You immediately think of your most intimate transactions. It's impossible not to. Your thinking regresses backward quickly through all communications.
It's no secret that our electronic communications confer the most precious details of our lives: where we are, who we're with and what we're doing. One comes to Jesus quite quickly in these moments, which is rapidly followed by the crushing resentment of “how did this happen and why?”
I've never taken my stations for granted, as a member of Parliament or a former diplomat for Canada. I've recorded, in thorough detail with the authorities in the past, relationships where I questioned the motivation of those forming a bond with me. My triggers were always lavish gifts, suspicious backgrounds and a forced effort to create a closeness.
In 2021, after changing residences, I requested a sweep of my homes for bugs. I was informed by the authorities that these services were not available for those outside of the executive of government. I had a security assessment done in my home and the recommended security system installed, to the remark of a colleague who indicated that they could see who killed me after I was dead.
Do I desire the 24-hour protection of some of my colleagues? I'm very nervous about reaching that level of notoriety. Yes, I've been stopped in the vitamin aisle and in the deli section by those who recognize me, but this is, of course, another level.
The most disturbing aspect of this is having been informed by not even a second but third hand, so I'm very grateful to have run into Luke de Pulford at the inauguration of the Taiwanese president in Taiwan and to have thanked him personally for his intelligence and for sharing with us.
Despite our differences, I've also always had an affection for the United States, having done my master's degree there and having served as the Canadian consul to Dallas from 2010 to 2013. I'm not surprised that it was actually the Federal Bureau of Investigation that surmised this breach and informed IPAC, which then informed my colleague, who then informed me.
This does, however, not dismiss the pervasive and persistent disappointment I have in not being informed directly by the Canadian government. As a consul, I felt a keen guardianship for all Canadians in my host region. I wish the Canadian authorities reflected the same sentiment in informing me about my violators. I can only deduce that they did not.
My sense of disappointment is overwhelming. The fear that consumes you when you think about the possible effects on you and your family, you try to push it out of your head, like a tooth your dentist says needs to be pulled at a later date. As a legislator, you consider what needs to be done to protect you and those around you, as well as your colleagues. You take this path knowing that a part of your life is not your own, but this validates it in a manner far more vast than you would like to consider.
In closing, I believe in evil and not just in the biblical sense. I believe in malice in the hearts of men—those who wish to intentionally inflict harm upon others. One need only refer to Navalny or the 37 murders in the republic of Mexico in the most recent elections. I'm not talking about someone saying I'm hot or not online—I have thicker skin than that—but about the potential for real harm to me or to my loved ones.
This attack appears on the surface to have been minimal in impact, but it indicates a far greater concern that someone is watching. They want to know what I'm doing, who I'm meeting and where I will be.
Evil, when confronted, will always try to realign, but the tactics are always the same: divide, conquer, intimidate and extort. These micro-acts of aggression are the genesis of the foundation of intelligence-gathering. The reality is that what you don't know can hurt you.
Thank you very much.