Procedure and House Affairs Committee on March 1st, 2023

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Based on that, obviously, this coordination was not in place prior to the 2019 election, so previous elections did not have this level of coordination in terms of verifying and monitoring potential interference.

Is that correct?

[Alia Tayyeb]

It's a fair point. They did not have it in this particular format. However, the security intelligence agencies that are represented here today have always worked very closely together on foreign interference or threats to any electoral processes.

We didn't have in place the formal arrangement that I spoke about earlier today, which is not to say that the coordination and the collaboration were not already taking place prior to then.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

That's perfect.

As we heard in the previous panel, the question of interference or attempts at interference is not something new, so I assume that the creation of the task force was really just to formalize, as you said, the coordination and sharing of information.

You also talked a bit about the briefings that are provided to a panel of senior public servants who serve on the panel and the political parties that participate in this process. Could you give us a little more information on the types of briefings that would have been provided and their frequency?

[Alia Tayyeb]

Yes, indeed, Madam Chair.

It is important to note that every briefing was slightly different. I would say that in both the 2019 and 2021 elections, the briefings commenced with what I would call an overall threat briefing to provide a lay of the land and provide the political party representatives an expectation of what we generally see in the security intelligence community, what we view as ongoing foreign interference in Canadian society, what it looks like and some of the tactics used. We would call that a general threat brief, which would have been part of the first brief.

In some other logistics, we would have solicited views from the members in terms of how often they would like to be briefed and if there were any additional considerations they wanted us to be mindful of. We would introduce ourselves and we would walk through any logistics.

Subsequent briefings happened not exactly on a precise, regular basis, but I would say they were every couple of weeks throughout the election campaign. In 2019 and in 2021, there would have been a few. There would have been three, four or five, let's say, per election campaign, but I couldn't say that there was a set schedule on both occasions.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

That's perfect.

Based on the briefings that would have been provided by the task force to the senior public servants on the panel, they determined there was no incident or incidents that would have impacted the integrity of the election. Is that correct?

[Alia Tayyeb]

I'm sorry, but did I misunderstand your first question? I thought you were asking me about political parties. I just want to confirm that I answered correctly the first time.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

You did.

[Alia Tayyeb]

Okay. Thanks. Understood. In terms of the panel, similarly, yes, the panel was briefed regularly by the SITE task force in both electoral campaigns and ultimately did not find that there had been information that would reach the threshold required to advise Canadians.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much.

On the previous panel, we heard from Ms. Thomas. We heard often about the fact that they are guardians of protected information and that there's a duty to protect national security. The role is to detect, deter and counter foreign interference. She also mentioned that obviously in this forum we are in public and that members of PROC do not have the level of security clearance to be able to receive some of the briefings that perhaps NSICOP or other public servants would have received.

Is that accurate? For the sake of our national security, we obviously cannot have this information in the public domain. Would you agree with that?

[Alia Tayyeb]

Indeed I very much agree with that. Classified information by its very nature is that which is very sensitive. It could endanger human beings. It could endanger really sensitive techniques and tools that are utilized by the intelligence community, and revealing sensitive information certainly would pose a risk to Canada and Canadians should that information become available to our adversaries.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

I have one more quick question. Obviously this is an evolving threat. Given what you may have seen in the 2019 election and what you may have seen in 2020 and 2021, would it be accurate to say that the SITE task force is constantly evaluating the methods it uses in terms of being able to gather this information?

[Alia Tayyeb]

That is an excellent question. We have said on several occasions that the threat environment is challenging and evolving and that the techniques being used are more sophisticated. The SITE task force members continue to meet to discuss those and to evolve our techniques and ensure that we can keep pace with those developments.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

You have six minutes, Ms. Normandin. Go ahead.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

I want to follow up on something I heard to make sure I understand correctly.

Once you know about a disinformation campaign, you have identified the source and, on top of that, you see artificial amplification of the content, you meet the threshold for informing the public. Do I have that right?

[Alia Tayyeb]

I want to make sure I understood the question. Indeed we are tracking those trends on a regular basis. Those trends and any information that we as individual members have are briefed to the panel. The panel will make a decision as to whether that reaches a threshold that requires a public announcement.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Let's say you aren't absolutely certain that misinformation was artificially amplified or you have doubts as to the origin or source of the misinformation. Is there a risk that you won't be able to recommend making a public announcement that a campaign may be under way?

[Tara Denham]

Perhaps I can provide a bit of context into what we've heard. This panel has heard a lot about how difficult it is in the disinformation landscape. When we look for artificial amplification, we want to understand that landscape. We're continually learning about it, but if we're not able to ascertain that there's a foreign aspect behind that, which is pushing that amplification, then again, from our perspective, that is not something we would be focused on. We want to be very careful that Canadians can also fully express their opinions. We don't look at the national dialogue. We're looking for foreign interference. When we can't see that, we don't focus on that.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Given how increasingly sophisticated technology is becoming, isn't there a risk that you can never really be sure that the source of the disinformation is foreign or that the content is being artificially amplified? That lack of certainty would mean that the protocol was constantly being circumvented and that the public was never being made aware of incidents.

Having a protocol is well and good, but isn't it an exercise in futility to some extent?

[Alia Tayyeb]

I could add one point there. I don't want to prejudge the decision-making of the panel members. From our perspective, you'll hear that we are mandated to focus our attention on foreign interference and foreign-influenced activities. We don't monitor—any of us—the internal dialogue of Canadians, who have the right to express themselves.

Having said that, and as Tara indicated, we would brief the panel. The panel could—and this might be something to ask the panel—if they determined there was sufficient impact.... Again, the threshold for the panel is whether this information threatens Canada's ability to hold a free and fair election. I suppose that if they felt this threshold was met, even in the absence of foreign interference, they could choose to do that.

I think we are not in a position to talk through what their considerations might have been in a particular circumstance, but I hope that answers your question.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

I'd like to hear about your discussions with the panel of senior public servants.

Did the panel share with you measures it may have been planning to take to counter the disinformation and ensure a more open and fair election? Did the panel inform you of actions it was considering taking?

[Alia Tayyeb]

The nature of the discussions with the panel was that our role, at least as SITE members, was to provide them with the information. Certainly, they would have had follow-up questions asking us for updates on any information we would have provided and seeking additional information, but the deliberations of the panel in any decision-making would have been their own, and we were not involved in those discussions.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

I take that to mean that if the panel had ideas on how to ensure electoral transparency and fairness, it didn't necessarily ask you whether those measures would work. That wasn't the nature of your discussions with the panel. Do I have that right?

[Alia Tayyeb]

To clarify, the panel is the panel as formulated in the protocol. They're also a committee of senior officials and deputy ministers, and part of their responsibility would also be to discuss response options. If there was any information presented to them that they felt required a response that was not a public announcement but some other form of response, they absolutely had the ability to provide that advice, question or suggestion, or to initiate a discussion at least.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

I don't have much time left, but out of curiosity, I'd like to know how the panel members are chosen.

[Alia Tayyeb]

That unfortunately is not a question I would be able to answer. The panel was established further to the protocol, which was undertaken by the PCO, so that would probably be best directed towards them.