Evidence of meeting #15 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chinese.
A video is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Christine Normandin Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Bridgman.
Mr. Brooking, you talked about the fact that Canada was a kind of test bed for artificial intelligence, particularly in the 2025 campaign. Why is Canada particularly vulnerable compared to other countries? Is it because there are gaps in oversight? Is it because it's a middle power, which means that it's less monitored by like-minded countries? What makes Canada more vulnerable?
Director of Strategy and Resident Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council
Very much picking up on Dr. Bridgman's answer, I would say it is the interrelation between the U.S. and Canadian information environments. Many of the same heavily AI-focused and AI-driven influence networks that target Canada also have some origin and overlap in their targeting of U.S. citizens. Essentially, we share a common information space. Canada has had the most recent election; this election overlapped in many ways with other points of foreign policy tension between the United States and Canada, and there were political partisans in the U.S. who were especially interested in the Canadian election. These factors, I think, contributed most to making it a sort of test bed.
We've looked out across the constellation of foreign interference efforts over the past year, and as I said, there are not as many examples of, say, a clearly organized campaign originating in Moscow or Beijing targeting Canada. However, there are very clear examples of harmful and widely shared narratives—false and undermining Canadian election integrity—that were spread on these platforms and then most likely spread opportunistically by foreign actors.
Bloc
Christine Normandin Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
Quickly, what were the main sources of interference and attempts to use artificial intelligence during the last campaign? Where did that come from? You may have already said, but I missed it.
Director of Strategy and Resident Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council
It's difficult to link AI use to a particular campaign. I would say that we observed it first in the context of financial fraud, actually. We noticed a number of deepfake videos of Prime Minister Carney and other candidates in which they would be promoting certain websites or products, which would lead people down a scam journey.
Although the intent may have been financial fraud, it was also deeply politically charged and amplified, and not just in Canada.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Chris Bittle
Thank you very much.
We'll go to Mr. Calkins, please, for five minutes.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Ponoka—Didsbury, AB
The first question is for Mr. Burton.
In October 2024, Brookfield Asset Management brokered a $256-million loan with the Bank of China while the current Prime Minister was the chair of that company.
In light of what we know about China cultivating business ties with senior policy-makers and business leaders, would you classify this as a classic example of elite capture?
Senior Fellow, Sinopsis, As an Individual
I am concerned about this. It's similar to our appointment of Dominic Barton as the ambassador to China. What if the prime ministership is a transitional job for Mr. Carney, and he returns to business afterwards? The Chinese will naturally take into account what sorts of policies he engaged in with regard to China while he was in that position.
I'm not suggesting that Mr. Carney is consciously preparing for this, but the effect is the same. One is concerned about matters like this and his previous connections with the Chinese regime. His current policies, which emphasize promoting Canadian prosperity through seeking to expand Canadian exports into the Chinese market, mean we aren't implementing the registry, we aren't dealing with Chinese espionage in Canada and we're not taking effective measures against agents of the Chinese regime who are involved in intimidation and harassment activities in our country and so on. The Chinese note that.
If you look at the impact of our not implementing the registry from the Chinese government's point of view, I think they welcome it and see it as similar to the Uyghur resolution, which the Prime Minister and the entire cabinet didn't vote in favour of. They think we don't really mean it; we're not actually going to do it, and they'll continue to engage in their influence activities in Canada unhindered.
The other country we have to look at is the United States, which has increasing doubts about the integrity of Canada as a country that has not been infiltrated by China or other states. We could run into problems with whether we're going to continue in our role with the Five Eyes and the extent to which the United States feels it can share information with us without it being leaked to the PRC. There are a lot of implications in what you're saying. It's a very complicated question.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Ponoka—Didsbury, AB
I understand. It's a very complicated position that Canada finds itself in right now.
You intimated in your testimony, Mr. Burton, that the eagerness with which the Minister of Public Safety and the government went about passing Bill C-70 seems to be dissipating. Time has gone by, and we have no appointed commissioner. You intimated that there seems to be some softening in the implementation and the approach the government is going to take, if they ever eventually get around to appointing a commissioner.
Do you think this is because of pressure from Beijing? The Taiwanese have warned us very much that this is exactly the way the PRC does its business. Do you think this registry is being compromised as part of a larger influence campaign from China?
Senior Fellow, Sinopsis, As an Individual
Whether it's active or passive is another question, but I agree with the recent statements by the leader of the Taiwan delegation here in Canada, by Michael Kovrig and by others that we have a problem of evidently responding to Chinese agendas in Canada.
This is an ongoing process. In other words, the infiltration gets deeper and deeper as time goes on. China is becoming more and more aggressive. We're seeing concerns about Chinese infiltration into Canadian infrastructure. The lead story in the National Post today was about the possibility of Chinese sabotage of our water supply by working with the filtration stations.
It's not just the water. It's the EVs. All sorts of areas suggest that a future conflict with China will not be about buildings blowing up in faraway countries. It will be that the ATMs won't work anymore. The electricity will turn off. Real Canadian citizens will suffer real consequences from China's cyber-infiltration into our system, which appears to be an ongoing matter.
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Chris Bittle
Thank you very much, Mr. Calkins.
Ms. Brière, you have the floor for five minutes.
Liberal
Élisabeth Brière Liberal Sherbrooke, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to all the witnesses for being here.
Mr. Bridgman, during the 2025 election, political influencers accounted for nearly half of all the political content that was published. Beyond the volume of content, those political influencers were also garnering attention. Some of you mentioned in your opening remarks that Canadians are not only worried and skeptical, but also vulnerable. You also mentioned that there were structural vulnerabilities in the Canadian system and a failure in governance. Knowing that those influencers' platforms are unregulated, I'd like to know what we could do, formally, to regulate them and protect ourselves.
Director, Media Ecosystem Observatory
That's an excellent question.
I'll start my answer by saying that influencers are here to stay. Right now, that's how young people take an interest in political content, and that will continue. It's true that our research team observed a shift in mindset in 2025. More than half of political content and engagement was playing out that way. This is a dynamic that's being observed around the world, not just in Canada. There has been a shift in the way information is consumed. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it's important to be careful.
During an election, there are certainly a lot of rules surrounding spending limits and what can be said or promoted during a campaign. Influencers are like a new entity. They're different from traditional media and organizations, but they have a much deeper impact on the opinions and behaviours of Canadians. That means it's important to think about how the law will deal with that. How will it treat this new group, which has much more influence than all the other groups, but which isn't regulated in the same way?
Here's an idea. Lauren Southern appeared before the committee one year ago. She's a major Canadian-born influencer, but she now lives in the United States. She was involved in the Tenet Media scandal; some $10 million originally from Russia had been used to support a group of influencers in Canada and the United States. In her testimony, she said that she was just a small media organization with little money. She said that was her position in her remarks. Okay, but if she's a real organization, if she's a company, and if she pays taxes to the Canada Revenue Agency, then she isn't just an influencer. We have to stop thinking about an influencer as a single person. In fact, influencers have editors, researchers and an entire infrastructure. It's true that, in Canada, there's less money in all of this and there are fewer people like that. However, in the United States, an influencer is a media outlet. When people talk about Joe Rogan, they're talking about not just Mr. Rogan, but also his entire team and all the infrastructure behind him. In fact, he and his team have more impact on American politics than all the rest of the media and all the other traditional actors.
Personally, I think it's really worth reflecting and taking action to formalize or limit the role of influencers in the ecosystem. I think a good start would be to do so through the Canada Elections Act.
Liberal
Élisabeth Brière Liberal Sherbrooke, QC
Thank you very much for your comments.
Mr. Brooking, would you like to add anything?
Director of Strategy and Resident Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council
Picking up on these excellent points, I would first observe that with the changing landscape and the impact of influencers, revisiting the utility of such things as a ban on formal political advertising or electioneering is also required, simply because these sorts of rules are not evenly applied against the most consequential actors in this space today.
Finally, I'd add that another way to begin to get at this problem is actually via the foreign influence transparency registry. I understand that this is principally a tool to control or understand formal state lobbying, but it could also be applied in some instances when there are particular influencers in the space who are clearly advancing a foreign state agenda.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Chris Bittle
Thank you.
We will turn to Madame Normandin. I will use my discretion since we are merging two sections.
You have the floor for five minutes.
Bloc
Christine Normandin Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Burton, you talked a lot about the registry of foreign actors, but I'd like you to talk to us about something that may be a blind spot. I know you have covered this topic before. I'm talking about the acquisition of companies by foreign actors. We know that there aren't really any private companies in China; everything is connected to the state.
I'd like you to talk about the risks of not better regulating the acquisition of Canadian businesses by Chinese actors. It's also a matter of bringing Chinese technology into the country. Think of electric vehicles, which are now outright espionage tools, depending on how they are used. We saw that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police acquired drones made in China. Is this a blind spot that should be addressed?
Senior Fellow, Sinopsis, As an Individual
It's an excellent question. You're right. I have written about this.
Since 2009, I've published over 200 pieces in the Canadian national press. I'm not sure how much influence they've had on Canadian government policy, but I keep trying.
We have to understand that any Chinese business is part of a coordinated complex led by the Chinese Communist Party. As the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, said, the party is in charge of everything. Any investment also involves the party, the military, the security agencies and the government. They're all coordinating together. That's really why you see such an excellent discount on the sale price of Huawei technology. One assumes that they factor in the opportunities for intelligence and data collection when they sell it.
There's a lot of Internet of things stuff going on. The U.S. is concerned about TP-Link routers, which are considerably cheaper. When I heard about this, I smashed mine with a hammer, but the one I had to buy to replace it was four times the price of my excellent TP-Link router.
There are concerns about this, in all investment. Is there something else? If China wants to buy a money-losing gold mine up north, you find that it's quite close to a NORAD facility and has an outlet into the Northwest Passage. The mine was losing money, so why did they want it? All of these kinds of investments are tricky.
The problem is how we determine whether an enterprise is in fact operating under the influence of a hostile foreign power or simply ethnic Chinese people who want to make a good investment. I think we need to look at that carefully. Of course, we don't want to be involved in discriminating against Canadians simply because of their ethnic origin, but it's a serious matter, and we're clearly not sufficiently on top of it. We need to put a lot more resources into protecting Canadian national interests.
It's really like a game of go. The Chinese are putting down tiles everywhere, and eventually they're going to encircle us. It's just a matter of time. The process happens because we don't really fully appreciate their overall planning.
Bloc
Christine Normandin Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
Thank you very much.
Mr. Shull, I would like you to tell us about Canada's position. The registry still isn't effective, but the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States have one. Canada is clearly lagging behind when it comes to the registry of foreign actors. How does that position Canada, considering that it's part of the Five Eyes?
Managing Director and General Counsel, Centre for International Governance Innovation
Thank you for your question.
Not well.
I don't know. I'm not security-cleared. I'm just some guy, so I have no idea, but I can't imagine it's helpful.
The other thing we don't have is a national security strategy. In your last question, you were talking about strategic state behaviour. At the risk of stating the obvious, I think strategy begets strategy. In order to respond, one needs a strategic framework. Our last national security strategy was done in 2004, and it has not been updated since. If we're talking about gaps and things we might want to get our hands on, I would start with a strategic framework, where this is all linked.
I have a hard time seeing differences among traditional national security, economic espionage, data governance, the spy and cyber stuff. It's all part of the same thing now. Strong states are going to do what strong states do. They've been doing it since the dawn of time. This is perfectly logical behaviour. We need to respond with a strategic framework too.
Liberal
November 27th, 2025 / 11:55 a.m.
Conservative
Grant Jackson Conservative Brandon—Souris, MB
Thanks, Chair. I appreciate that.
To all the witnesses, it's nice to meet you, some of you virtually, some in person. Thank you for being here today and sharing your expertise.
I have to admit, as a new member of Parliament, that all of this is quite concerning to me, particularly as a young Canadian. The more I hear from experts with various perspectives on this issue, the more I find that government as a whole has left Canada—particularly young Canadians—very vulnerable to the influence, whether passive or not, of foreign actors who are not our friends and who have no interest in doing us any favours. I'm very alarmed by this.
In particular, my perspective is that of one of the few members of Parliament from gen Z; we get all our news from social media. None of us is going to cbc.ca—or very few of us are. Most don't follow the mainstream media. I would argue that's probably similar for diaspora communities; they predominantly favour other types of information sources to get their news.
We have a question about how active foreign operators are in those spaces and what, if anything, is being done to govern that to ensure that we're getting the truth and not necessarily what some foreign country wants us to believe.
I'll start with Mr. Shull and Mr. Burton on that front.
Managing Director and General Counsel, Centre for International Governance Innovation
It's a great question.
You don't have to take my word for it. Justice Hogue, in the long and thoughtful study she did, identified the information ecosystem as the primary threat to Canadian democracy, and that's because adversarial states are leaning into it.
However, the original sin is the business model of the platforms. They're commercializing and harvesting intention. They're using sophisticated behavioural targeting ads to persuade you. These are persuasion machines, and they're not broken. This is the way they were designed. This is the way they were built. We have individualized ad cocktails that are being served up, and this is breaking people's attention spans. It's actually making us generally stupider.
This is the thing. This is all set to get way worse. The trend lines don't look good, so intervene where you can. The problem we're going to bump into is large incumbent players with lots of dough and super sophisticated lobbyists thinking everything is just fine. They don't care about any of the stuff I just said.
Add to that the fact that we still have reptilian brains, so we're easy to persuade. Add to that the fact that we have charter protections. Freedom of expression is a real thing, so people are allowed to say stuff, and you also have the right to be wrong. It's a cacophony of issues.
I can't settle this in 45 seconds, because it's super complicated, but as a starting point for this committee, if we can get this registry thing sorted, it's one thing you can tick off your list that will be helpful.
Conservative
Grant Jackson Conservative Brandon—Souris, MB
Mr. Burton, I'm going to add something to my question for you to answer.
We know that WeChat, for example, is a very popular PRC-linked social media platform, and it promoted Prime Minister Carney and the Liberal team during the last election.
I wonder, specifically with respect to this, what connections you draw for something my colleague Mr. Calkins mentioned: the $276-million loan Mr. Carney secured prior to his winning the Liberal leadership. Do you think there's a connection at all between the November deal and winning the Liberal leadership, as well as this happening during the April election campaign?
Senior Fellow, Sinopsis, As an Individual
Are you young enough to use TikTok? TikTok not only sucks up a lot of information about you, Mr. Jackson, but also shapes your opinion through very cool, short pieces that target you specifically, based on an understanding of the kind of stuff you would buy into. It's an extremely sophisticated and subtle mechanism.
In terms of WeChat, the language of my home is Chinese. I use WeChat every day because it's the only way I can communicate with my former colleagues and classmates from my education in China. It is clearly very sophisticated in the same sort of way. It sets out messages that are pro-PRC, and it's active here in Canada. Ashbury College in Ottawa not only has an Ashbury College WeChat site, but has, for every single grade, a WeChat site to speak to Chinese parents in the Chinese language.
I would never put anything on WeChat that would be in the slightest way political. You can see that the degree of specificity of this technology—I don't think it's from humans, but from algorithms—is staggering. We should be worried about it.
I was very much involved in the Kenny Chiu matter, in which similarly anonymous Chinese sources were very sophisticated in their manipulation of people's attitudes towards this candidate.