Information & Ethics committee  Yes, 100%, this happens all the time. Look at the U.S. and Canada. The United States is our biggest neighbour. They are constantly influencing us, whether or not we like it. That's why we have CanCon laws. With the trucker convoy you mentioned earlier, there was a lot of influence from the U.S. and even U.S. politicians.

Information & Ethics committee  I will just say that, yes, it happens between democracies as well.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, for sure. I think this has probably been touched upon already, but accountability, really calling out officials if needed and necessary, is important. This could be calling in diplomats of the relevant countries; putting out very public statements condemning these kinds of actions; and increasing the evidence, again like Mr.

Information & Ethics committee  —exploring targeted sanctions against companies that are exporting or selling technology to countries that use us against individuals. I will leave it at that.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, for sure. Very briefly, again, I don't want to directly say correlation is causation, but we see this in other communities as well. When there's criticism of Israel, for example, there are reports of increased anti-Semitic attacks. Similarly, over COVID, the coronavirus, there was increased resentment towards Chinese immigrants.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I would say that with the current evidence, no, I can't give you a definitive answer.

Information & Ethics committee  I think there are two big points to it. One, it's directed by a foreign government and happening on our territory.

Information & Ethics committee  It could, but we would also need more evidence, right? We can't assume that, just because people are against the speaker, they are automatically being influenced and told what to do by the Chinese government.

Information & Ethics committee  I think it comes back to this: which allegations? Are we talking about online influence operations, writ large, or very targeted harassment? With target harassment, I don't think we're exaggerating those impacts. Those are very clear. They have pretty long-lasting impacts, as evidenced by the other panellists.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes. I don't think you're wrong on any of the points you just made. Going back to my statement, I think we also have to understand why people might be consuming this. This gets back to the grievances. How do we rebuild trust in institutions and the media?

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I think we tracked 79 countries that, in the last 10 years, have passed laws on misinformation and foreign interference in elections. They will very frequently cite or point to democratic nations such as the U.S., Canada, France, Germany, the U.K. or Australia for why they're doing what they're doing.

Information & Ethics committee  I haven't researched specifically the Australian foreign agent registry. My sense though is that Canada could set one up. How effective it would be.... A lot of these operations are covert or clandestine by nature. Even if you were to put agents and register everyone, my sense is they will find alternate means to evade or circumvent the registry.

Information & Ethics committee  Good morning. I'm Gabrielle Lim, a doctoral fellow at the Citizen Lab. I'm also a researcher at the Harvard Shorenstein Center. My research focuses primarily on information technology, civil liberties and security, with a specialization in mis- and disinformation. While the views I present are my own, they are based on research carried out by me and my colleagues.