Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 9th, 2023

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you, Mr. King. Before we go to Mr. Fisher, I understand that there are two different directives: during an election period compared to when we're in government.

Mr. Fisher, why do we hear so little about it? Yes, we hear about it, but clearly not much in the general public via the government to citizens.

[Adam Fisher]

Thank you for the question.

Maybe it's a symptom of where I work, but I find that we are talking about it more and more. That's the honest answer from me.

I think about where we were five or 10 years ago. I couldn't have thought of being in front of a committee like this and speaking openly about Chinese foreign influence, Russian foreign influence and Iranian foreign influence. It just wouldn't have happened, so I think we have made progress.

We can go further, but it takes time. We're on the right track.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you very much.

We have Ms. Blaney for up to two and a half minutes.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

One of the other issues that I'm really concerned about is misinformation and how that's impacting.... I have an especially significant concern about any impacts it has for rural and remote communities, indigenous communities and different ethnic communities, so I want to preface that.

I saw that the report released by the CSE in 2021 states clearly that Canadian voters will very likely encounter “some form of foreign cyber interference” in the next federal election, so my question for you is this: Can you explain what that foreign interference looks like online?

What policies are being implemented? What measures are being taken to educate Canadians, so that they have some awareness that this might be happening to them and that they should question it? How are we protecting Canadians?

[Lyall King]

Thank you for your question.

In terms of online misinformation, disinformation, malinformation and that whole ecosystem, it's unfortunate that our Global Affairs colleagues aren't here with us today to speak about it, because that is very much their domain in terms of SITE's role.

Generally speaking in terms of the trends, we're concerned. Looking at what Canada is going to be susceptible to, I suppose, is the ultimate thing. What is the intent of foreign actors and what are their foreign policy objectives, for example, with respect to Canada?

We have the fortunate—and sometimes unfortunate—issue of being very close to the U.S. Our media ecosystems are very intertwined. That is an issue as well, in terms of spillover. Sometimes that disinformation isn't necessarily directed at Canada, but we're getting blowback effects because it's part of the North American ecosystem. It is problematic.

Sometimes it is hard to discern the origin of the information. The methodologies employed by adversaries are pretty good. They intentionally obfuscate who they are, so it's hard for us to identify who's in behind. We have clear examples in the past of, say, Russia sharing disinformation around COVID, etc. That was aimed at a number of different audiences.

It can take a lot of different forms and isn't exactly being directed to Canada, yet we still feel the impacts.

What can we do? I would just like to point out—and I'm sure this is true of the service as well—that CSE and the cyber centre are making more of a concerted effort to specifically engage with indigenous communities, so that we understand their needs from a cybersecurity perspective. Given that there are different geographies and different complications there, how can we better support and understand their needs?

That is certainly on our radar. Things that we're engaged in—I'm sure that is the same for the service—are looking at particular communities and doing outreach to educate, understand and let them know what the risks are.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you so much.

I have been so impressed over the last few weeks on how long one sentence can go on for. It's really impressive to see that it's not just elected officials who can really extend a line. It's an impressive skill to gain over time.

Go ahead, Mr. Berthold. You have five minutes.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here.

Ladies and gentlemen, what I gather from the first hour of testimony is that, unfortunately, you are not in a position to disclose much information to us. In reading the many documents that have been sent to us, we've had the opportunity to note that every time we became a little more specific or asked for a little more information that would allow us, as parliamentarians, to take action and make decisions to introduce bills and propose legislative changes, we are unfortunately deprived of that. The information you have can't be made public and can only be sent to the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians to determine whether the information should be made public.

So here's the problem we have. During an election period, this non-intervention or this decision to follow the process can directly affect the outcome. We saw this yesterday with the former ambassador, Mr. Burton, who told us that he believes that had it not been for the massive online disinformation campaign against MP Kenny Chiu, he would still be a member of Parliament today. Respecting a process and following the steps means that, unfortunately, it also affects the outcome of the election.

I understand your discomfort and the difficulty of your work, but since our only source of information is from journalist Sam Cooper, let me look into a few allegations and see exactly what you can tell us.

First of all, he told us of documented evidence that the Chinese communist regime is trying to infiltrate all levels of government.

It says here, “there is a substantial body of evidence that Chinese officials are actively pursuing a strategy of engagement to influence Canadian officials in ways that can compromise the security of Canada and the integrity of Canadian institutions.”

Is that true? I'd like a short answer: yes or no.

[Cherie Henderson]

Thank you for the question.

I'm going to respond in English, just for clarity.

One thing that we're very concerned about, actually, is that every Canadian and all levels of government—

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Madam Chair, with all due respect, I'm just asking if the statement is true.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Let's stop for a few seconds.

Sometimes we ask long questions, and they have to be answered with a little information. Since we are all respectful, we will give Ms. Henderson a few moments to answer the question.

[Cherie Henderson]

Thank you.

All levels of government are susceptible and targeted by foreign interference actors. I am not going to specifically name a state, but I would say that all levels of government are. That's provincial, federal and municipal. All electoral candidates are.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Why can't you name a country?

[Cherie Henderson]

I think we can easily say that we know China is very engaged in focusing, but there are other nations as well out there. I would always be very concerned to focus on one nation and then lose the focus of what else could be happening from other hostile activities of states.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Here's another statement:

It says, “Chinese officials used local, pro-Beijing community groups as intermediaries to engage Canadian politicians they identified as strategically valuable.” Is that true or not?

[Adam Fisher]

Yes, it's true.

We see China—in particular, China—using non-traditional methods of foreign influence activity. They're not relying necessarily on trained agents. They use cut-outs. They use proxies. They use community groups, and they use diaspora organizations and community leaders.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you.

Is it true or false that Chinese foreign interference against elected officials and public servants in Canada is very well documented by the various agencies?

[Adam Fisher]

Yes, that's true.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you.

This is from a Global News source.

You apparently have information about China's efforts to influence Canadian politicians.

[Cherie Henderson]

Again, I am not going to speak specifically to one state, but every Canadian politician is potentially susceptible to foreign interference activity. Every Canadian politician needs to be aware of that and then learn how to defend themselves. The best way to defend themselves is through awareness and discussion.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Without naming names, do you have any specific, well-documented cases of the Chinese regime interfering with Canadian politicians?

[Cherie Henderson]

I can say that we definitely have seen specific cases of hostile activities of states against politicians. In those specific cases, we definitely brief our government on the challenges that are being faced.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Ms. Sahota, you have up to five minutes.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

This has been an interesting conversation. Of course, unfortunately, it's not overwhelmingly enlightening. I feel like we're going a little bit in circles from where we started. I was talking with the analysts earlier. The job of this committee is to gather all of this information from all of the wonderful witnesses we have had, but due to our not having certain security clearances and not being able to get the information that's needed—and Mr. Calkins was even referring to that—it's hard to make proper recommendations that will improve the oversight we have in Canada and get the best results with the most protection of our democracy for Canadians.

A lot of what we've heard from previous witnesses—or at least the witnesses we had on Tuesday—was that perhaps the threshold is too low and maybe we should be having a higher threshold to sound the alarms, and that our job is to gather information, not necessarily to analyze that information.

Would you be able to leave this committee with some type of recommendation as to what more we can do as a government and as a committee to recommend something to government, so that Canadians have confidence in our system? It's not about the one riding or political gain from one party to another and, to some degree, it's disappointing that this is the conversation we've ended up having throughout this study.

It's about our democratic system. It is about that larger picture that you were talking about, Mr. King, which you said you might not be able to answer to. However, I am sure that, being on this task force, you probably do think about those larger issues, because I think about them at night. It keeps me up wondering where we're headed with our institutions and our democratic system. I'd really like any of you to provide us with some insights as to what our recommendations should be.

[Cherie Henderson]

I can start. Thank you very much for the question.

One of the things that I think we need to do is to make sure that our security agencies actually have the tools we need in order to do our jobs. The CSIS Act was created back in 1984. In terms of a lot of the challenges we're dealing with today on the technology side, the creators of the CSIS Act did not foresee those kinds of challenges.

The other thing within the CSIS Act is that we cannot share classified information with provincial or municipal partners. We need to be able to do that, but section 19 of our act specifically prohibits it. Just to be able to have the tools we need as an agency to be able to properly investigate and advise the government on threats would be extremely valuable.

[Lyall King]

Perhaps I can add a few comments as well, Madam Chair.

I think we'll be very honest, and my colleague Adam has stated this: This is a learning process for all of us.

Adam, you mentioned that 10 years ago you wouldn't have imagined sitting here before committee. I wouldn't have imagined sitting here before committee two years ago, I can tell you.

We're making a concerted effort, I think, to be more transparent, putting out our information and declassifying information more and more. I'll give the example of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, where CSE has declassified information and literally put out on Twitter feeds that we've observed activities and instances of Russia sending misinformation about, say, Canadian Forces operating in Ukraine.

Those things can change. I think we are on a path of being more and more open, and I think we will continue down that trend. I think that's one thing. I would suggest it's as much a culture.... Within our organizations to wrap our heads around that, it doesn't happen overnight. I think instances like war will trigger a drastic response.

I think that's a thing and that is not unique to Canada. I've heard that reflected from my Five Eyes colleagues also.

I'm sorry, Lisa. You look like you want to speak. Please go ahead.