Evidence of meeting #121 for Public Safety and National Security in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was russia.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Mr. Kolga.
We go now to Mr. Shull.
Mr. Shull, go ahead, please. You have five minutes.
Aaron Shull Managing Director and General Counsel, Centre for International Governance Innovation
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, members of the committee. It's a pleasure to be with you again.
I think I would start by just noting what we all know, that Russian disinformation campaigns pose a grave threat to our democracy, but they also follow what we refer to as a calculated disinformation kill chain. It begins by pinpointing societal vulnerabilities and then crafting deceptive content to exploit these weak points. Through amplification by bots and fake accounts, these false narratives gain undue prominence and are further spread by unwitting influencers. By manipulating the public's reaction, these actors sow discord and confusion, achieving their goal of undermining our democratic processes.
Now, in response, Canada has implemented a number of measures. One of them is the rapid response mechanism, which monitors and addresses foreign information manipulation. We also have the digital citizenship contribution program through Heritage, which supports these efforts by promoting digital literacy and raising public awareness.
Looking ahead, we must, however, do more to strengthen our defences. First, by expanding our sanctions regime in coordination with our allies, we can impose tangible consequences on those perpetuating disinformation. Second, by utilizing the Communications Security Establishment's offensive cyber-capabilities, we can disrupt disinformation networks at their source, following the successful model that the NSA, in the United States, used in advance of the last election. Finally, we must implement a national digital resilience strategy that engages all levels of society.
This strategy would involve collaboration with provincial and territorial governments to embed digital literacy in school curricula, ensuring that students from an early age are equipped with the critical thinking skills needed to navigate the digital world. Additionally, agile adult education programs, led by educational institutions and supported by community organizations, would provide vulnerable populations and the wider public with the tools to recognize and counter disinformation.
Public awareness campaigns coordinated through community hubs like libraries and local cultural institutions would reinforce these efforts by ensuring that digital literacy becomes a national priority.
Let me pause there for a moment: Digital literacy must become a national priority. By fostering collaboration between government, civil society and educational institutions, we can create a unified and resilient front against foreign information manipulation and interference by helping Canadians critically assess the information they encounter and reducing the societal impact of disinformation.
Recent intelligence assessments, including CSIS's report entitled “Moscow's War in the Ukraine: Implications for Russian FI Activities in Canada”, highlight the ongoing risk we face. While Canada differs from other Western nations in its level of exposure to Russian foreign influence activities, these operations do persist and target specific groups, including the Russian diaspora in Canada, to promote disinformation about the conflict in the Ukraine.
According to CSIS, Russia is using pro-Russian proxies and witting or unwitting influencers to amplify narratives aimed at discrediting Canada's policies on the Ukraine and smearing the Ukrainian diaspora. These attempts are particularly concerning given the size of the Russian-speaking population in Canada and the Kremlin's focus on exploiting divisions within Canadian society. Furthermore, the CSIS report stresses that while Russian foreign influence activities have declined in some areas due to its loss of reputation in Western countries, we cannot afford to underestimate the continuing threat. Russian state-linked actors remain committed to using disinformation to undermine social cohesion and trust in Canadian institutions and to counter Canada's strong stance on Ukraine.
Our understanding of this threat continues to evolve, and there has been important recent research that highlights valuable insights. The report, entitled “Canadian Vulnerability to Russian Narratives About Ukraine”, authored by my co-panellist, Marcus Kolga, who is testifying, reveals that a significant portion of Canadians, indeed, 71%, have been exposed to at least one Kremlin narrative. Many believe these narratives or are unsure of their falsehood. This highlights the urgent need for comprehensive media literacy programs and increased public awareness to counter the spread of Russian disinformation in Canada.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and I will look forward to questions.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you.
We'll go now to our round of questions.
We'll start with Mr. Shipley, I believe, for six minutes, sir.
Conservative
Doug Shipley Conservative Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON
Thank you, Chair, and thank you to both of our witnesses for being here today.
I'd like to start with Mr. Kolga.
Mr. Kolga, welcome back to our committee. I have a two-part question, Mr. Kolga. Can you speak about how Russia uses transnational repression to discourage dissent and exert control over individuals living in Canada?
The second part to that is, how can we, as legislators, better protect diaspora communities from these forms of control and coercion?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
Indeed, Russian transnational repression is a persistent and growing threat to our democracy. Transnational repression itself is when a foreign regime uses coercion, threats, intimidation and violence to discredit and silence regime critics, including activists, minority communities and even parliamentarians. This is happening in Canada. In the worst cases, the Kremlin has tried to poison its critics, like the Skripals in the United Kingdom, or use brutal violence, like in the case of Alexei Navalny's colleague, Leonid Volkov, in Lithuania.
In Canada, we've observed Russian government surveillance of diaspora groups, campaigns to discredit parliamentarians and efforts to incite hate towards the Ukrainian diaspora. I've personally been targeted multiple times by the Kremlin and their proxies and influencers in Canada to intimidate and discredit me. Russian state media regularly publishes articles about me. Former Canadian diplomats, academics and officials connected to Kremlin think tanks like the Valdai club, Russian companies and a trade promotion agency have tried to discredit and defame me through poison pen campaigns. I was among the first Canadians placed on the Kremlin's sanctions list.
In 2019 I received a series of emails threatening to kill me and my family, originating from Internet IP addresses in Canada and in Moscow. When I looked to help from the RCMP, they told me to report it to my local law enforcement agencies. They, in turn, told me to report it back to the RCMP, who then told me to report it to CSIS. CSIS, as we all know, is a black hole that focuses primarily on the collection of information. Luckily for me, an officer in York Region picked up my file a few months later and opened an investigation. They found one culprit, a radicalized Russian nationalist living between Thornhill and Florida. Thankfully, York Regional Police provided me and my family with victim training and a phone number to call in case of a future emergency.
I should also mention that for the Ukrainian community, Russia's incitement of hate has manifested in violence towards Ukrainian community members, including vandalized businesses, homes and even vehicles. Students have been intimidated, and the Ukrainian Canadian Congress has even been forced to create a national crisis hotline to support victims.
We've also witnessed parliamentarians targeted with transnational repression. In 2018, the Deputy Prime Minister, Chrystia Freeland, and her family were the targets of just such a campaign, where historical facts were distorted and manipulated to defame her and her entire family and, in fact, the entire Ukrainian community. A story was first planted into a Moscow blog that was run by an alleged former KGB agent. It then spread from there into the constellation of Kremlin-aligned online proxy platforms. That story eventually metastasized into our national media, which willingly ran this very well-orchestrated Russian information operation against her. This is not unlike the Chinese state's Global Times campaign against former Conservative Party leader Erin O'Toole in 2021, which, coincidentally, was first exposed by my organization, DisinfoWatch.
The campaign against Ms. Freeland also demonstrates that Russia is playing the long game, operating between elections to impact election outcomes, not just during elections—an important fact that has been clearly missed by the commission looking into foreign interference in our elections. In terms of national security, this is a significant threat, as we currently leave the door wide open for Russia, China and Iran to target and attack our citizens and residents. We need to be doing much more in terms of protecting these vulnerable communities.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Mr. Kolga, I wonder if you could move your microphone to just above your upper lip.
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
Is this better?
Liberal
Conservative
Doug Shipley Conservative Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON
Thank you, Chair, and thank you to Mr. Kolga for that answer and thank you, Mr. Kolga, for your courage in all you do and for being back here today.
My second question, Mr. Kolga, is also for you. Recently, Canadians learned that the Liberal government used $340,000 of taxpayer money to fund a Russian propaganda film titled Russians at War. Do you think it is appropriate for the Government of Canada to be funding a Russian propaganda film?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
I think the basic answer is no.
The content of that film and the nature of it have been widely discussed in the media over the past couple of weeks. One point that I think hasn't been made clearly enough is that the vetting process for granting money for these sorts of projects, even for film festivals that decide to screen films like this, is clearly not rigorous enough. We are ignoring the threat of Russian information operations, the way they try to manipulate us and how they do it.
With regard to this film, it would have taken some simple vetting to look at the filmmaker. The fact that the filmmaker made 12 films for RT over the past decade or less—it was six years, or something like that—should have been a huge red flag. We know, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, that RT is an extension of Russia's intelligence apparatus. Again, it didn't take much. You just have to put the filmmaker's name into Google and you would find this out.
I would conversely say that there are some very good Russian journalists we should be supporting—people like Dmitry Muratov, the editor of Novaya Gazeta, who's in Toronto today to speak at a gala for Journalists for Human Rights. He bravely speaks out against the Kremlin, despite all the threats against him, and he continues to live in Moscow.
There are hundreds of independent Russian journalists living abroad whom we could be supporting, who will speak truth to the war and who have been doing so. They've been forced into exile.
There's a lot more that we could be doing. Again, we have to be very careful about who we're funding in terms of any sort of content that's proposed about Russia.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Mr. Shipley.
We go now to Ms. Damoff for six minutes, please.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I'm sorry, Chair. I didn't realize that I was first up here. Thank you.
Thank you to both witnesses for being here today.
Mr. Kolga, it's lovely to see you again.
We've talked a lot about disinformation when it comes to Ukraine, but the previous witness also talked about it being on housing, inflation, immigration and the Prime Minister that Russia is feeding disinformation that is finding its way into Canadian discourse.
Mr. Kolga, maybe we can start with you. I wonder if you can talk about the influence that Russia is having on these particular conversations.
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
Thank you for the question. It's good to see you as well.
This is a very good question. I don't think we're able to necessarily directly measure the impact of these narratives. You are right that Russian state media and its influencers on both the far left and the far right—it's important to note that they're on both sides of the political spectrum—target some of the most polarizing issues in society today. They target both sides of them, and they use influencers, proxy platforms and state media, like RT, to start tearing in both directions in order to pull apart the cohesion of our society.
These documents that I mentioned in this FBI affidavit—and I strongly recommend that every member of this committee look up the affidavit and look into the documents that are included there—clearly outline these objectives, and they're exactly consistent with what I was saying before. What these operators do is they look for those. They monitor our information space. They monitor social media for those specific subjects, and then they develop narratives in the Kremlin and with the organizations that work with them to attack those narratives. They've been effectively doing this.
I would say that in this affidavit I'm mentioning that is connected to the “Doppelganger” affair, one of the primary tactics there was to create fake news outlets. I think the impact of that was probably quite low, and I think we focused far too much on it. What we haven't focused on is the role that the influencers play in these campaigns.
That affidavit says that there were nearly 2,000 influencers in the western world who were used to amplify those narratives. I know that there are Canadian influencers as well, again on the far left and the far right, and we know from the Tenet Media indictment that there are clearly Canadians who are helping with the amplification of those narratives.
That's where the real threat is. We don't know what the impact is, but it is an important part of Russia's disinformation laundromat to clear out the Russian state fingerprints on them and to have those narratives amplified in our own ecosystem.
The final point I would make is that in a study that we did with Digital Public Square in 2023, we actually found that there were 200,000 accounts on Twitter that were actively promoting these narratives to Canadian audiences, and over 90% of them were far left and far right accounts, so in terms of impact, we do have that number.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
There's a Canada subreddit where it came out that four user accounts represented 92% of submissions, and they were Russian-run propaganda.
I'm not on Reddit, but I wonder if you could speak to how these comments put on platforms like Reddit, Rumble and others.... Canadians may think, “Well, I'm not on Reddit, so I'm not influenced by them,” but how do these comments filter from those platforms into the common discourse, so that people believe the disinformation is true even when it's not?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
I'll answer very quickly, and I'll let my copanellist answer as well.
You don't have to be on Reddit to be exposed to these sorts of narratives. You mentioned Rumble. That's a very important platform for the far right. You just have to be on Twitter or any other social media account. These narratives are planted everywhere by these Russian operatives, so—
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I'll just interrupt. Even if you're not on Twitter.... I had a senior come into my office who had heard information at a coffee group. He's not on Twitter, but it filters from these social media platforms into the seniors' coffee groups.
Is that right?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
You're absolutely right, because they filter from Russian state media into social media and to influencers, and then they also migrate onto alternative media platforms that some people in our community might be consuming because they don't trust mainstream media or they don't see value in that sort of media. That's how these narratives metastasize from the state media—again, social media—through proxy platforms.
As we saw with Tenet Media, the Kremlin is also paying these sorts of influencers. The people at that coffee club meeting may be consuming media from those sorts of platforms. Tenet Media is the only platform that we know of right now. I am sure, as I said in my opening remarks, that it is the tip of the iceberg.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
Mr. Shull, I don't know how much time I have left, but did you want to comment on that?
Managing Director and General Counsel, Centre for International Governance Innovation
Yes, sure. To pick up on what Marcus said—I don't want to let this point go sailing by—they're pushing both left-wing and right-wing ideologies. That means they don't care about the message, so the question becomes, what is the objective? It's to polarize societies. It's to undermine trust in institutions. It's to exploit social tensions. It's to discredit opponents. It's to shift public opinion on foreign policy. It's to promote Russian interests. It's all to sow confusion and create mistrust. That's what they're trying to do.
Your question was a sound one, but it was about the tactical approach. The tactical approach is which platforms you use, which message you send and how long it is or how many characters there are, but the broad point is that the underlying current of all of this stuff is these pretty sick objectives.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Ms. Damoff.
Mr. Fortin, you have the floor for six minutes.
Bloc
Rhéal Fortin Bloc Rivière-du-Nord, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon, Mr. Kolga and Mr. Shull. Thank you for being with us today to discuss this important study.
Mr. Kolga, you mentioned an affidavit from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or FBI. This document would provide a brief explanation of the situation as perceived by the FBI in the United States. Do you have a copy? Can you send one to the committee?
Bloc
Rhéal Fortin Bloc Rivière-du-Nord, QC
Thank you, Mr. Kolga.
You said earlier that you yourself had been a victim of reprehensible behaviour, but that you didn't know where to lodge a complaint. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the RCMP, the regional, municipal and other police, as well as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, or CSIS, are all passing the buck. A witness in the previous panel touched on the subject by suggesting that an organization dedicated exclusively to combatting interference be created.
I would like to know what you think about that. In your opinion, could such an organization meet the needs expressed and help counter these interference tactics?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute, As an Individual
I completely agree that an agency, a unit within government, to support the victims of transnational repression would be extremely helpful.
When these sorts of attacks happen, it is psychologically taxing. It is very difficult to deal with them. Reputations are harmed. There are impacts on family members. At the moment, there is zero support for the victims.
I would also argue that there are hundreds, possibly thousands, of victims of transnational repression in Canada right now. We have seen how the Chinese government has targeted its own diaspora, and how it has targeted Uyghur and Tibetan activists in this country.
The only support they have is when we talk to each other. We have an informal network, and we try to do as much as we can to support each other. The government really does have a role here to support those victims, but also to enforce the laws that we have by implementing Bill C-70, which will provide some degree of protection for the victims of transnational repression.
I would also argue that Canada has a role to play in creating an international network of nations where there are victims who are targets of transnational repression. Canada is not the only country where there are victims. We know that citizens of the U.K. and Sweden, among others, have been targeted. Working together, maybe within the framework of the G7 or NATO, might be helpful in creating that international network and an international front, like a coalition, to push back on transnational repression.
Bloc
Rhéal Fortin Bloc Rivière-du-Nord, QC
Thank you, Mr. Kolga.
Have you asked any federal government body to create such an agency or an intermediary with whom interference complaints could be lodged?