Hello, Madam Chair.
My name is Sophie Marineau. I am a doctoral candidate in the history of international relations at the Université catholique de Louvain, in Belgium, and I specialize in Russian foreign policy. In recent years, my work has focused primarily on the use of disinformation as a tool of foreign policy, more specifically in the 2016 and 2020 American elections. I have also done a lot of work on the war in Ukraine and the effectiveness of western sanctions.
The study of Russian interference in the American elections is particularly relevant in that we must not look at interference in Canada as an isolated phenomenon, and must rather see it from a more global perspective. Russian interference in the recent American elections was so extensive, including through the use of social networks, that platforms like Google, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit were held to account and had to explain how the Russians had infiltrated their platforms to carry on massive disinformation campaigns and undermine Americans' confidence in their electoral system and government institutions. In the reports produced by Twitter and Facebook, in particular, the methods used and the results achieved are reported in sufficient detail to become a method or process to follow for other actors, potentially China, who might use them against Canada.
In the United States, the investigations revealed that the disinformation campaigns and attacks were not limited to social media and had also resulted in violence in real life. The FBI was able to show that there had been interference in the organization of the rally in Charlottesville in 2017 where members of the alt right and Black Lives Matter supporters faced off, ending with three dead and nearly 50 injured.
In a parallel move, Russians were also involved in organizing a gathering in Houston, Texas, where adherents of the nationalist Heart of Texas movement and of United Muslims of America ended up in the same place at the same time. Once again, it led to violent incidents.
Based on Russia's current approach, the disinformation and interference has several parallel objectives, including sowing chaos, undermining Americans' confidence in their electoral system and their institutions, and trying to influence the election in order that the party in power would be more sympathetic to Russia.
Foreign interference in all its forms often has the effect of blurring the traditional lines of a conflict or an attack by another country, which makes the effort to combat the phenomenon of interference that much more complicated.
As we have seen in the United States, the work done by the government alone is not sufficient to eradicate the phenomenon. The government cannot be the only rampart protecting us against these all-out attacks. The interference has to be exposed. Media platforms, social networks, institutions, political parties and the general public have to be made aware of these phenomena, and a collective effort is what will make Canada better able to protect itself against foreign interference.
Thank you.