Good afternoon, Chair and members of the committee.
It's an honour to be here today and to contribute to this important discussion.
Foreign governments engage in espionage and foreign interference activities that target Canada and Canadians to advance their own interests at our expense, in order to gain a geopolitical, economic, military or strategic advantage.
In doing so, they covertly seek to sow discord and disrupt our economy and the ingenuity of the academic sector. In many cases, clandestine interference activities aim to support foreign political agendas or deceptively influence Canadian policies, research centres, democratic processes or representatives.
Unfortunately, Canada's fundamental institutions are active targets of foreign interference activities. Academia and the research sector are, sadly, no exception. On university campuses, foreign states, including the People's Republic of China, seek to exert undue influence covertly and through proxies by harassing dissidents and suppressing academic freedoms and free speech.
Foreign interference and espionage in academia can take many forms, from covertly influencing research agendas or peer-review processes to engaging in funding arrangements, where details about the source of funds are deliberately obscured or misrepresented. Common techniques can include blackmail, coercion, illicit financing, intimidation and disinformation. They also include theft of intellectual property, preventing its future monetization and thereby harming Canada's overall economic development. These activities are increasingly used by states such as the PRC to exploit Canada's innovation and commitment to research partnerships.
The good news is that we can protect research in Canada through education and knowledge transfer to increase resilience in the face of foreign interference and thus ensure that government investments are not used to advance the research of hostile states. It also includes measures to ensure that our intelligence community's toolkit, policies and authorities remain up to date and enable us to deal with an ever-evolving threat.
The interests of Canada's adversaries were once limited to competition between governments. The priorities of threat actors today have widened to include Canada's advanced research in emerging technologies and big data. The result is aggressive targeting by some foreign states of institutions and individuals beyond the Government of Canada.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, or CSIS, has produced thousands of intelligence reports and provided details about these threats.
In order to raise awareness, CSIS has reported on this and other forms of foreign interference in our annual public report—we have copies—and we have published several tailored unclassified reports, including the snappily titled “Foreign Interference and You”, which was developed for all Canadians and community groups, as well as more publications specifically for universities and the research sectors, such as “Protect Your Research”, which are available in multiple languages. These publications have been accompanied by extensive outreach and awareness-raising efforts aimed at building resilience through our stakeholder engagement program.
Foreign interference remains a recurring problem, and it has grown in scope and complexity in today's digital age. What's more, new technologies such as artificial intelligence will only exacerbate the problem. Protecting Canada's national security is a team effort and requires action from the whole of society.
CSIS is a committed partner in this effort, and our team of dedicated and talented professionals are working hard to keep Canadians safe, secure and prosperous.
We will be very pleased to answer your questions.
Thank you.