Evidence of meeting #17 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was data.
A recording is available from Parliament.
6 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
What about in a situation where the “informed source” is wrong, as the WHO has been?
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
I think one of the advantages of our platform is that there is ongoing debate and opposing points of view in the content that is made available by our users.
6 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
But your platform community guidelines say it would remove content that would have an opposing viewpoint to the WHO.
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
I think in practice, when we're dealing with issues of particular notoriety and severity, we're acting quickly and we're following those guidelines.
6 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Again, there seems to be some ambiguity here on the purpose of this policy. Would you say that it's less about misinformation and more about perhaps upholding existing political dogma on a certain topic?
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
No. I would say it's wholly about providing authoritative and reliable information to the user.
6 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
I'm curious. If I post this clip to my YouTube channel, will it meet community guidelines?
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
Sorry, I don't see how it wouldn't. It's being broadcast right now, and we're having a straightforward conversation with an obvious difference of opinion.
6 p.m.
Conservative
6 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sherry Romanado
Thank you very much.
Our next round of questions goes to MP Ehsassi.
You have five minutes.
6 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Thank you very much to each one of the witnesses.
I've found today's testimony incredibly helpful. I say that because there's been a flurry of activity in different jurisdictions and contact tracing is obviously of great interest. However, to step back from the technical details, I want to ask each of you a very short question.
For contact tracing to work, in each one of your estimations, what percentage of the population of a jurisdiction has to participate or has to be part of that process? Could you provide me with numbers?
Mr. Perron.
6 p.m.
Director, CyberQuébec
I have not researched this question, so I will defer comment.
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
I'm afraid I don't have an estimate for you.
6 p.m.
Head, Government Affairs and Public Policy, Google Canada
No.
However, I'll say that the reason Apple and Google are working together is a recognition that we need collaboration across platforms so there is the greatest possibility for public health authorities to make that option available to our users.
6 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Thank you.
Mr. Johnson, roughly what percentage of the population of a jurisdiction has to participate to make it an effective tool?
6 p.m.
Partner, British Columbia Public Sector, Global Business Services, IBM Canada
I can tell you what I'm hearing from other countries and from experts. I can't give a position myself.
The general percentages I'm hearing are that it's between 60% and 80% to get an effective coverage. That, I think, is what seems to be in the public.
6 p.m.
Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mimik
Yes, I've heard the same data. It's about 60% to 70% of the population.
The only way, in my opinion, to get that going is to give trust to users, that they have their own data and they are in control of it. Nothing goes to the cloud to get anonymized post. Everything is basically managed on the edge device, calculated on the edge device, and it's in their control.
That's the whole architecture we've been following, to basically inhibit the data even going to the cloud. Everything is getting processed and calculated on the device, and it's across device, across operating system, across network and cloud.
6:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
That being said, you were referring to a triple A rating for privacy. I understand that Google had the opportunity to elaborate on what their privacy safeguards were, but we didn't have a chance to hear from you specifically on that issue.
Could you elaborate on what the privacy features are in your app?
6:05 p.m.
Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mimik
Again, with the hybrid cloud edge platform, the data resides on the device itself. It gets calculated on the device. We don't send location information to the cloud. We measure proximity on the device level, and we do proximity mapping using hybrid cloud edge. I would know two devices were close to each other, but I wouldn't know who that device belongs to and where the device has been. That's the most important thing. We provide visibility to the end user to decide which data at which point they want to share with which health care provider.
They have the control to say whether the health care provider can copy or keep the data or if they want to only have access to and view that data. These are the only ways that I as a citizen would use an application like this. I would recommend it to my parents, my sibling, my loved ones. Otherwise, I as a technologist would be the first one to avoid using such technology.
Once I have the contact tracing, there should be an action, an incentivization to share some data. Incentivization should not be with advertising, but should be, for instance, for health care services offering something that I receive in care and support in case I get sick that I would now be willing to share some information with the right person and the right point of contact.
6:05 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Thank you.
To step out from the contact tracing issues, Mr. Johnson, as part of the IBM global task force you have a bird's eye view as to what's taking place in various jurisdictions.
Are we as a country doing a good job leveraging our digital infrastructure to be ready not just for COVID but for future pandemics as well?