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Minister of Foreign Affairs appearance at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs (PROC) on Foreign Election Interference

2022-12-13

Table of Contents

  1. Scenario Note
  2. Opening Remarks
  3. Biographies of PROC Members
  4. Overview and Analysis of Media Coverage
  5. Transcript of Study Meeting #1 (November 1, 2022)
  6. Transcript of Study Meeting #2 (November 3, 2022)
  7. Transcript of Study Meeting #3 (November 22, 2022)
  8. Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force (SITE)
  9. Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM)
  10. Critical Election Incident Public Protocol (CEIPP)
  11. Global Affairs Canada (GAC) Role in Responding to Foreign Interference
  12. Disinformation – China
  13. Disinformation – Russia
  14. Allegations of Chinese Interference in GE43
  15. Canada-China Bilateral Relations
  16. Allegations of PRC “Police Stations” and Recent Diplomatic Engagement
  17. Foreign Interference – China

Scenario Note

Timeline of this Study

Since November 1, the Committee has held three meetings on Foreign Election Interference, and has heard government witnesses from Elections Canada, CSIS, CSE, GAC, and the RCMP. Other witnesses include the organisation Disinfo Watch and a former director of CSIS.

Committee Membership

Context

Your invitation was precipitated by a November 7 article by Global News entitled: Canadian intelligence warned PM Trudeau that China covertly funded 2019 election candidates: Sources. The story claims that:

Reponses by the leaders of parties in the House:

Comments by the lead Opposition MPs on Foreign Election Interference:

Opening Remarks

The Honourable Mélanie Joly

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada

Madame Chair, members of the Committee, thank you for the invitation to discuss foreign election inteference.

And thank you for examining the matter of foreign interference in Canada’s federal elections.

We all know the world is at a critical moment in time. The world’s power structures are shifting. Democratic systems are under threat, and in some cases attack. We know that Canada is not immune, particularly given the realities of our interconnected world. The reality is that we can’t take anything for granted, and that includes being vigilant in protecting our own democracy.

Les rapports faisant état d’ingérence étrangère chinoise dans l’élection générale de 2019 au Canada sont profondément troublants. Nous prenons ces allégations très au sérieux, et je parlerai de la Chine de façon plus détaillée dans un instant.

D’abord, j’aimerais dire que la protection de notre démocratie contre toute forme d’ingérence est une priorité d’une importance cruciale pour le gouvernement du Canada.

Nous devons nous assurer que nos élections sont légitimes, crédibles et fiables.

Nous adoptons une stratégie pangouvernementale pour contrer les menaces à l’intégrité électorale, à la prospérité et à la souveraineté du Canada.

[Reports of Chinese foreign interference in Canada’s 2019 General Election are deeply troubling. We take these allegations very seriously, and I will speak about China in more detail in a moment.

First, let me say that protecting our democracy from any form of interference is a critically important priority for the Government of Canada.

We must ensure our elections are legitimate, credible and trustworthy.

We’re taking a whole-of-government approach to countering threats to Canada’s electoral integrity, prosperity and sovereignty.]

Le Protocole public en cas d’incident électoral majeur a été créé avant les élections générales de 2019.

Le Protocole établit un processus simple, clair et impartial qui permet d’informer les Canadiens de toute menace à une élection après son déclenchement. Un groupe fédéral d’experts en sécurité nationale, en affaires étrangères, en élections et en droit est chargé de suivre ce processus.

Le Protocole fait partie du plan pangouvernemental visant à protéger notre démocratie. Ce plan repose sur quatre piliers : la lutte contre l’ingérence étrangère, la création d’un écosystème de l’information sain, l’amélioration de l’état de préparation des citoyens et le renforcement de la préparation organisationnelle.

The Critical Election Incident Public Protocol that was created ahead of the 2019 general election.

The Protocol lays out a simple, clear and impartial process for notifying Canadians of any threats to an election after it has been called. A federal panel of national security, foreign affairs, electoral and legal experts is responsible for following that process.

The Protocol is part of the whole-of-government Plan to Protect our Democracy. The Plan has four pillars: fighting foreign interference; building a healthy information ecosystem; and ensuring citizen and organizational preparedness.]

Le Groupe de travail sur les menaces en matière de sécurité et de renseignements visant les élections – également connu sous le nom de Groupe de travail MSRE – est un autre élément important de ce plan.

Ce Groupe de travail est composé de représentants du CST, du SCRS, de la GRC et d’Affaires mondiales Canada. Ceux-ci travaillent ensemble pour prévenir les activités secrètes, clandestines ou criminelles qui pourraient perturber les élections canadiennes. En outre, ils surveillent diverses activités en ligne et hors ligne et aident le gouvernement du Canada à évaluer les menaces et à y réagir.

Le Mécanisme de réponse rapide du Canada surveille le réseau d’information en ligne pour y repérer des signes d’ingérence étrangère et coordonne l’échange d’information et la réponse au sein du G7 en ce qui concerne les menaces étrangères à la démocratie. Le Canada dirige le Mécanisme de réponse rapide du G7 depuis sa création lors du Sommet de Charlevoix en 2018.

[The Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force – also known as the SITE Task Force – is another important part of this plan.

The Task Force is made up of officials from CSE, CSIS, the RCMP and Global Affairs. They work together to prevent covert, clandestine or criminal activities from disrupting Canadian elections. They monitor various on and offline activity and support the Government of Canada in assessing and responding to potential threats.

RRM Canada monitors the online information environment for signs of foreign interference and coordinates information-sharing and response across the G7 related to foreign threats to democracy. Canada has led the G7 Rapid Response Mechanism (G7 RRM), since it was established during the Charlevoix Summit in 2018.]

Pendant les élections fédérales, le Mécanisme de réponse rapide du Canada est membre du Groupe de travail MSRE. Il est de plus chargé de l’analyse de source ouverte des menaces étrangères en ligne. Ce travail représente une source d’information pour le Groupe de travail MSRE et peut servir de système d’alerte précoce pour les autres membres du Groupe de travail ou les membres du groupe d’experts. En plus de surveiller le réseau en ligne, le Mécanisme de réponse rapide tire parti de son réseau du G7 pour communiquer les leçons apprises et fournir des renseignements provenant d’autres contextes électoraux sur les menaces ou tactiques potentielles observées dans d’autres pays.

En tant que membre du Groupe de travail MSRE, le Mécanisme de réponse rapide du Canada a organisé, lors de la dernière élection fédérale, une formation sur l’ingérence étrangère à l’intention des ministères et organismes concernés. Il a de plus contribué à des séances d’information sur les menaces à l’intention des hauts fonctionnaires, des partis politiques et des médias, et produit des comptes rendus quotidiens.

J’aimerais maintenant parler des campagnes de désinformation et d’ingérence menées par la Russie et la Chine.

[During federal elections, RRM Canada is a member of SITE and is responsible for open source analysis of potential foreign threats online. This work represents one information source for SITE, and can serve as an early warning system to other members of the Task Force or members of the Panel. In addition to monitoring the online environment, the RRM leverages its G7 network to share lessons learned and covey insight from other electoral contexts on potential tactics or threats identified in other countries.

As a member of SITE, during the last federal election RRM Canada organized training on foreign interference for relevant departments and agencies; contributed to threat briefings for senior officials, political parties and the media; and produced daily reporting.

Let me now speak about Russia and China with respect to disinformation and interference.]

Russia

While Canada has not been a primary target of Russian disinformation in recent years, Russia has long used disinformation and propaganda to advance its objectives.

This is well-known, as are the Kremlin’s tactics of creating polarization narratives aimed at undermining trust and social cohesion in the West.

Canada continues to work with international partners to monitor and share information on the tactics used by Russia, particularly related to disinformation campaigns.

In recognition of the importance of this work, this past summer the Prime Minister announced the expansion of RRM Canada to include a dedicated team to focus on Russian disinformation as part of Canada’s strategy in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.

While the team continues to monitor Russian tactics, to date the team has not observed any targeted disinformation campaigns by Russia related to Canadian elections.

China

China shows growing sophistication in carrying out online campaigns to influence Canadians and people worldwide.

Beijing can quickly saturate social media platforms with messaging, but it is also nimble enough to micro-target Anglophone, Francophone and Chinese-speaking audiences in Canada.

China is considered by some as being best able to spread its influence online, now that social media companies have curtailed Russia-aligned account activity in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.

In terms of the last federal election, RRM Canada did report that is observed some disinformation online, however, it was not able to fully attribute this activity to a foreign government.

Last month, I raised the matter of alleged Chinese foreign interference with my Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on the margins of the G20. I said that Canada will not tolerate any form of foreign interference in Canada.

And as I said recently in launching Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, we will do more to tackle foreign interference and disinformation.

The Strategy recognizes China’s growing influence globally. It states that domestically, Canada’s approach to China will include strengthening the defence of Canadian infrastructure and democracy against foreign interference. That includes interference in our elections.

Let me stop there for now, Madame Chair. I’ll be pleased to take your questions.

Thank you.

Biographies of PROC Members

The Honourable Bardish Chagger, Chair
LPC – Waterloo (ON)

Bardish Chagger

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Disinformation:

John Nater, Vice-Chair
CPC – Perth—Wellington (ON)

John Nater

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Russia:

Disinformation:

Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Vice-Chair
BQ – Laurentides—Labelle (QC)

Marie-Hélène Gaudreau

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Foreign Interference:

Disinformation:

Luc Berthold
CPC – Mégantic—L'Érable (QC)

Luc Berthold

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Russia:

Foreign Interference:

Disinformation:

Rachel Blaney
NDP – North Island—Powell River (BC)

Rachel Blaney

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Russia:

Disinformation and Misinformation:

Blaine Calkins
CPC – Red Deer—Lacombe (AB)

Blaine Calkins

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Foreign Interference:

Russia:

Disinformation:

Michael Cooper
CPC – St. Albert—Edmonton (AB)

Michael Cooper

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Foreign Interference:

Disinformation:

Greg Fergus
LPC – Hull—Aylmer (QC)

Greg Fergus

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Foreign Interference:

Mark Gerretsen
LPC – Kingston and the Islands (ON)

Mark Gerretsen

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

China:

Russia:

Sherry Romanado
LPC – Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne (QC)

Sherry Romanado

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Disinformation :

Foreign Agents:

Foreign Interference:

Cyberwarfare:

Ruby Sahota
LPC – Brampton North (ON)

Ruby Sahota

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Political and parliamentary roles

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Foreign Interference:

Ryan Turnbull
LPC – Whitby (ON)

Ryan Turnbull

Election to the House of Commons

Professional background

Committee membership

Points of interest to GAC

Disinformation:

Foreign Interference:

Overview and Analysis of Media Coverage

Media Analysis - Allegations of Chinese Interference in GE 43 & 44

Introduction

The volume of coverage on Chinese interference in Canadian elections from November 7 to November 24, 2022, was high. The tone was very negative. All the articles urged the government to be proactive and take China's alleged interference in the 2019 elections seriously. Overall, article angles were divided between criticizing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau versus investigating how this interference infiltrated the Canadian political system, and what concrete solutions could be. Many articles promoted taking a more critical approach towards China in the hope that this will be the case in Canada's new Indo-Pacific strategy (Toronto Star)(The Globe and Mail)(Edmonton Journal)(The Globe and Mail)(CBC). Several articles also highlighted Prime Minister Trudeau’s confrontation with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G20 (The Canadian Press)(La Presse)(The Canadian Press).

National Security

The issue of national security was mentioned in several articles. A piece written by Terry Glavin (Ottawa Citizen) denounced the dichotomy between Trudeau's discourse on national security and that of Canada's national security and intelligence agencies. Glavin argued that the 1984 CSIS Act needs to be updated, since the threats have evolved and come from new world powers since the end of the Cold War era. An analysis by journalist Emanuelle Latraverse (Le Journal de Montréal) and another by Stéphanie Grammond (La Presse) reiterated the same arguments. Shortly after the publication of the Global News investigation, articles were published criticizing the inaction of the government, pointing out that this interference was foreseeable, but that the issue had been ignored for several years (La Presse)(The Vancouver Sun)(National Post)(The Hill Times)(National Post). Similarly, former Canadian ambassador to China, Guy Saint-Jacques, pointed out that the Chinese have long understood that they can exploit Canada's political system (Le Journal de Québec). There were many articles denouncing the ease with which Chinese interference has taken hold in the country, and political commentator Tasha Kheiriddin argued that Chinese expats in Canada need better protection from people acting in the interest of the Chinese government (The Windsor Star). The new Indo-Pacific strategy spearheaded by Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly was cited as a hope that Canada will take an aggressive (Radio-Canada) and realistic (The Globe and Mail) stance on its relations with China.

Impact on Democracy and Pressure for Investigation

Other articles emphasized the consequences of this interference in the 2019 federal election on Canadian democracy, including concerns from Conservative Party members (National Post), such as Conservative leader Pierre Poilièvre (CBC). Journalist Mélanie Marquis also highlighted requests from Conservative MPs for answers (La Presse). Other publications stated that Canada is not immune to this type of interference and that Canada would be at fault if it assumes that foreign meddling could not have occurred on its soil. Columnist Andrew Phillips called for Canadians to refocus discussing problems with American democracy to addressing problems in their own country and complained about the government dodging questions (Toronto Star).

In general, both news articles and commentaries have expressed frustration with the lack of details that have been released to the public about the alleged election interference and noted increased pressure from the opposition on government officials to say and do more (Le Devoir). Columnist Brian Lilley criticized government inaction in countering these types of foreign interference in Canadian institutions and denounced the status quo (Toronto Sun). Trudeau's low level of aggressiveness on the issue was also criticized (Radio-Canada)(National Post)(Ottawa Citizen)(CBC), and an article in The Globe and Mail argued that the defence of democracy should be addressed as a non-partisan issue.

In particular, there was also confusion about the timeline of events regarding when the Prime Minister received what information and how it was presented (The Canadian Press)(CBC)(National Post)(Radio-Canada)(Toronto Star)(La Presse). There were questions about the Prime Minister drawing a link between these allegations and interference in U.S. elections (Le Devoir)(La Presse Canadienne). Several sources reported the assertion of Canada’s Chief Elections Officer Stéphane Perrault that Canada’s elections have been free and fair (The Hill Times)(National Post). Various outlets also reported on the Prime Minister’s statements during the House of Commons question period on November 23, writing that he dodged questions and remained vague about the details of the interference, referring to Perrault’s statements (La Presse Canadienne)(National Post).

Commentaries increasingly called on Trudeau to be honest with Canadians and release information about which candidates were targeted by Chinese interference (Toronto Sun)(Calgary Sun)(Calgary Sun). Others expressed confusion and doubt about the Prime Minister’s assertion that he had not been briefed about candidates receiving money from China and wondered, in that case, what it was that he had discussed with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G20 (The Globe and Mail)(Toronto Sun)(Toronto Star)(National Post)(Le Devoir)(Toronto Sun). In light of this confusion, columnist Lorrie Goldstein, in the Edmonton Sun, examined the various statements that have been made and concluded that nobody has denied that the interference has happened, but the details of the severity and how it was evaluated remain obscure.

Prime Minister Trudeau and President Xi’s Confrontation at the G20 Summit

There was heavy coverage of Prime Minister Trudeau’s interactions with President Xi at the G20 Summit in Bali. Coverage escalated especially after a video surfaced of Xi berating Trudeau for allegedly leaking details of an unofficial conversation in which Trudeau addressed election interference to the press (National Post)(Cape Breton Post)(The Globe and Mail). Furthermore, Radio-Canada reported Conservative MP Michael Chong’s evaluation that the entire episode was evidence of China’s lack of respect for Canada and that Canada needs to clarify its foreign policy toward China.

Commentaries about the confrontation were mixed in tone. Some authors wrote that Xi’s irritation was evidence that the Prime Minister is doing his job and urged him to continue to stand up to China (Toronto Star)(Edmonton Sun)(Le Devoir)(La voix de l'est). In the National Post, columnist Sabrina Maddeaux argued that Xi’s behaviour was an attempt at bullying Trudeau into standing down on investigating Chinese interference, and that Canada should not give in. Others criticized Trudeau for appearing to be weak and looking chastened in the released video, as well as for taking too long to address the CSIS report (National Post)(Edmonton Sun). Some commentaries appreciated the Prime Minister addressing the allegations with Xi but expressed displeasure that the government does not appear to have addressed them in the months since the original security briefings (The Globe and Mail)(The Globe and Mail)(The Halifax Chronicle Herald). A few authors expressed displeasure at partisan politics (The Hill Times)(National Observer).

Following the G20, the Toronto Star reported on a statement released by the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa exclusively in Chinese denying the allegations. According to Guy Saint-Jacques, these remarks are an attempt at misinformation specifically towards the Chinese diaspora in Canada.

Transcript of Study Meeting #1 (November 1, 2022)

44th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION
Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs
EVIDENCE
NUMBER 037
Tuesday, November 1, 2022
Chair: The Honourable Bardish Chagger

[Translation]

The Chair (Hon. Bardish Chagger (Waterloo, Lib.)): I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting No. 37 of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. The committee is meeting today to begin its study of foreign election interference.

The first panel of witnesses we will be hearing from is made up of the Chief Electoral Officer, the Commissioner of Canada Elections, and the staff accompanying them.

During the second hour of the meeting, we will be hearing from a representative of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and a representative from the Communications Security Establishment.

Today's discussion will relate to the new security threat presented by foreign interference in Canadian elections.

I would inform committee members that all witnesses who are attending virtually have successfully done the sound and connection tests before the meeting.

[English]

I would just like to remind members and our guests that all comments should be made through the chair.

My understanding is that our guests today will be sharing a combined eight minutes for their opening comments, and I will commence with Mr. Perrault.

Welcome back to PROC. [Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Perrault (Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada): Thank you, Madam Chair.

I am accompanied today by Serge Caron, deputy chief electoral officer for the digital transformation sector.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to address the committee on the important issue of the risk of foreign interference in our elections.

I should state, at the outset, that, during the past two general elections, Elections Canada did not experience any breaches to its IT infrastructure or interference with our electoral operations. We are also unaware of efforts by foreign actors to undermine the ability of electors to vote.

The expression "foreign interference" refers not to any particular activity but to a source of threat, which can take different forms: cyber-attacks, illicit funding of candidates, parties or third parties, disinformation campaigns, even intimidation. Because of the diversity of means though which it can occur, but also because it involves state-to-state relationships, addressing foreign interference in our electoral process requires efforts by a range of agencies and departments.

Today, I will talk about Elections Canada’s partnerships with other agencies in this area, as well as our specific role and our governing legal framework.

It is important to note that the Canada Elections Act does not define foreign interference. Rather, the Act prohibits the involvement of foreigners in our elections in specific ways that are primarily related to the political financing regime. For instance, only an individual who is a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident may contribute. As well, the act prohibits foreigners from registering as third parties, and third parties are prohibited from using foreign funds for their regulated activities.

The act also prohibits certain activities as representing what the act calls "undue influence by foreigners," such as incurring any expense to directly promote or oppose a candidate or a registered party during the election. However, the Act recognizes that foreigners can have some level of influence, for example, by making a statement encouraging electors to vote for a specific candidate or registered party.

[English]

The role of Elections Canada is to administer elections and protect them from threats, irrespective of their source. This includes taking appropriate steps with the advice and support of security partners in protecting election IT infrastructure. Elections Canada has made significant progress in that area in recent years, and we are fortunate to be able to receive ongoing support from the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, including close monitoring of our IT infrastructure.

Another key role for Elections Canada is to ensure that electors have correct information about the electoral process. This includes information necessary to register and to vote, as well as information that enables them to trust the electoral process and its results. To counter the spread of inaccurate information about the electoral process, whether the source is foreign or domestic, Elections Canada continually monitors publicly available information. When inaccurate information is detected in news media, on the Internet or on social media, it is addressed by communicating correct information.

It's important to note that our focus is on content related to the voting process and electoral administration. My mandate is not to scrutinize or to police what is said about party or candidate platforms by individuals or media organizations, whether domestic or foreign.

Protecting the security of our elections is a team effort and requires a whole-of-government approach. Elections Canada has been actively working with a variety of Government of Canada intelligence and security agencies, whose roles include detecting and responding to potential foreign interference, especially interference by state actors. These include the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the Communications Security Establishment, among others.

Together, we have developed protocols and practices for discussing threats to an election, sharing information when necessary, and ensuring that each of us is properly prepared to play our own role in the promotion of electoral security.

Madam Chair, I know the committee will be hearing from representatives of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, and of course they will be best positioned to speak to matters relevant to their own mandate.

[Translation]

Ms. Caroline Simard (Commisioner, Office of the Commissioner of Canada Elections): Thank you for the invitation to testify before the committee today, Madam Chair.

I am accompanied by Marc Chénier, deputy commissioner and chief of legal services in my office.

[English]

The issue of foreign interference is one that my office takes very seriously. As commissioner, my role is to ensure compliance and enforcement of the Canada Elections Act, which provides a legal framework for the activities of my office.

Activities that could be attempts at foreign interference are captured by several provisions in the act. The wording of the obligations and prohibitions of the act as adopted by Parliament determines the scope of our compliance and enforcement work.

For instance, the provision on undue influence is limited to the election period and does not capture the pre-election period.

[Translation]

It is also important to note that we are a complaint-based organization that operates primarily on the basis of complaints received from the public. We encourage Canadians to contact us when they believe an offence under the Canada Elections Act has been committed.

I would like to inform you that my office did not observe any significant change in the number of issues giving rise to complaints containing allegations of foreign interference in either the 43rd or 44th general elections.

As you can imagine, cases of foreign interference can pose significant operational challenges for our work. The presence of activities, individuals or entities from outside of our borders can significantly increase the complexity of an investigation.

Of course, these challenges are not unique to our office. [English]

Over the years, my office has worked with key law enforcement and national security and intelligence organizations. This was helpful to gain a better understanding of the potential threats to elections. It has also served to ensure effective communication, when appropriate, during an election period.

[Translation]

In conclusion, I wish to remind members of this committee that I am not in a position to discuss the details of files that may or may not be the subject of an investigation by my office. This includes any issues that may currently be the subject of a complaint or may have been the subject of a complaint in the past.

I would be happy to take your questions. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Commissioner.

We will now go to the first set of questions, in which each speaker will have six minutes.

We will start with Mr. Cooper, who will be followed by Ms. Romanado, Ms. Gaudreau and Ms. Blaney.

Mr. Cooper, the floor is yours for six minutes. [English]

Mr. Michael Cooper (St. Albert—Edmonton, CPC): Thank

you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the officials for being here.

I want to pose my question to Mr. Perrault. I want to specifically ask about foreign funding of third parties.

In the 2015 election, it was well established that a number of U.S.-based organizations laundered money through various entities. That money ended up in the hands of registered third parties. For example, nearly $800,000 of U.S.-based Tides foundation money was transferred to the Sisu institute society, based in British Columbia, which in turn was laundered to Leadnow, which actively campaigned to defeat Conservative candidates in the 2015 election.

Amendments were made to the Canada Elections Act in 2018 with Bill C-76. Would you agree that the loophole that existed at the time of the 2015 election was not fixed in Bill C-76?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, I agree that there remain areas where foreign funding could find its way through parties, though I'm not aware that it has. This is why I have made a recommendation to Parliament, which I will be happy to explore with this committee in future months, regarding the potential use of foreign funding.

Essentially, that loophole, if you may call it that, relates to the ability of a third party to use its own funds, so unless the money was provided specifically for a regulated purpose, then it would not be captured. What is an owned fund, and how can you address that?

I have made some recommendations, and I could expand on them today if the committee wants to hear.

Mr. Michael Cooper: I'd be interested in any recommendations you have.

Would you agree there is nothing in the act that would prevent

U.S. money from going to a Canadian entity, then to another Canadian entity, and then to another entity, for example? The source of that money might then be considered Canadian.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: There are opportunities for flows of money to make their way through a third party. If the party, however, raised the money for a regulated activity, they must disclose the source of the funding. It must be a Canadian source.

The concern is with money received for general purposes, which may, later on, become their own money, flow through various groups, then be used. In this case, it becomes an expense reported as from the source of the entity itself.

We have seen an increasing percentage of third parties funding their election activities with their own funds.

Mr. Michael Cooper: In short, loopholes exist with respect to third parties. You acknowledged that in your testimony on May 28, 2018, when you appeared before this committee. You said, “There is in my view a residual opening for foreign funding through third parties.”

Nothing has changed. Isn't that right?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I committed to look into this and come back with recommendations, which I have.

Mr. Michael Cooper: One recommendation you put forward was an anti-avoidance clause.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: No. It's a recommendation that groups funded, in large degree, through contributions be required to have a separate bank account. If they use money for regulated activities, it comes from that bank account, and every penny comes from individual Canadians.

Groups, however, whether they be corporations or unions, that are not fundraising entities but earn money in Canada would continue to be able to use their own funds, as would individuals.

A fundraising entity—someone who receives money by way of contributions—should be regulated in a different manner. That's an avenue I'm putting forward to explore with this committee.

Mr. Michael Cooper: To be clear, a foreign third party can accept foreign money. That's clear. They can accept foreign money.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: They cannot accept foreign money for the purpose of regulated electoral activities, but any—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Otherwise, if it's not specific to one of the regulated activities, there's no limit.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Any individual in Canada is a third party, unless they're a candidate. They may receive funds through investments or earnings from different sources, including foreign sources. That may also include contributions, unless it's for the purpose of regulated activities, you're quite correct. People and groups in Canada receive funds from different sources.

Mr. Michael Cooper: As you said, it could be commingled, and there's nothing in the act that clarifies this. How do you enforce...?

You said, set up a separate bank account if money is ostensibly donated on the basis of an administrative purpose. Then, it's commingled and used for a different purpose.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That is correct.

If money is given for general purposes, and not specifically for regulated activity purposes, it becomes their own money. It can then be used and reported only as their own money, even though it was a contribution.

I think that's an issue Parliament could choose to address in the legislation that reviews it.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Right.

What about an anti-avoidance clause?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: There are a number of anti-avoidance clauses in the act. I'm not aware of any prosecutions, although I may be incorrect.

Mr. Chénier has a long history of knowledge about these things and how effective they are. I'd leave that, perhaps, to Mr. Chénier.

Mr. Marc Chénier (Deputy Commissioner and Chief Legal Counsel, Office of the Commissioner of Canada Elections): Yes, there's a prohibition against circumventing the prohibition against using foreign funds. That was added by this committee when Bill C-76 was before this committee.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Ms. Romanado, the floor is yours for six minutes.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado (Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses for being with us today.

Mr. Perrault, I would like to thank you for saying in your testimony that Elections Canada had not experienced any breaches to its IT infrastructure or interference with its electoral operations during the past two general elections.

[English]

It's important to highlight that, because there were a lot of conversations and reports on whether or not there was interference in the last two elections. I want to thank you.

I understand, Madam Simard, that you also mentioned there was nothing in the last two elections, in terms of foreign interference.

One area I'd like to touch on is the pre-election period. We hear a lot about initiatives happening and efforts made during an electoral period.

Could you elaborate on some of the work you're doing in a pre- election period, in terms of making sure our elections are safe?

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I would like to make one brief comment. As I tried to make clear in my opening remarks, the expression "foreign interference" can have several meanings, depending on the context. That is why I tried to be relatively precise when I said we had not experienced any such situation at Elections Canada.

I would say there are two work streams in a pre-election period. [English]

One stream is working with our partners in the Government of Canada in terms of ensuring the security of elections. A lot of the work that goes on there, because people come and go between elections, is making sure everyone understands who is responsible for what, who you speak to when you have an issue, and which kinds of issues which agencies are responsible for. It's a lot of making sure the parameters of the mandates are understood and we have contacts. We also receive fairly high-level briefings from the security community in terms of the overall environment.

That's one stream of work. I would include in that stream our work in terms of cybersecurity.

The other one is making sure Canadians have the right information about the voting process. That is critical for us. That's really at the core of our mandate. For example, in the last election we put a lot of effort into putting information on our website about postal ballots, just because there was concern. How do we count them? What is the transparency? What are the safeguards in place to ensure the integrity of the process? That is an important part of our work.

Moving forward, I think we'll need to continue and expand on explaining to Canadians why they should be trustful of our elections and the procedures we have in place for them.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado: Thank you very much.

I have a follow-up question to that. You mentioned mail-in ballots. I understand that approximately 200,000 special ballots were not returned in the last election. Obviously, with COVID, a lot of people availed themselves of special ballots.

Can you speak to that a bit? There have been some comments that perhaps the results of the election would have been different if the ballots that weren't returned on time had been counted. I would like to get your comments on that.

Thank you.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: First of all, there's no indication that mail-in ballots had any swing effect on the election in terms of their spread. I'm not aware of that.

When we talk about this figure of 200,000, sometimes people talk about uncounted ballots. These were not uncounted ballots. These were ballots that were either not received or not cast. In some cases, electors came and voted in person. They had applied for a kit but didn't send in their ballot, or it was received late, or it was completed in a manner that the law directs us not to count and to set aside. These are accounted for. They are counted in the same way that at the polls, if a ballot is improperly marked, it is set aside. It doesn't mean it is not counted.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado: Thank you for clarifying that. As you mentioned, a lot of people have a misunderstanding of these “uncounted” ballots, as they call them.

You brought up misinformation campaigns. We've seen more and more, with social media, the ease with which misinformation about elections can happen. What are some of the other safeguards? In your testimony you mentioned that immediately, once you see something out there, you counter it and say, no, this is in fact the situation, whether it be the dates of elections or how people can vote.

Can you elaborate a little on what else we can be doing in terms of making sure that misinformation is addressed? The problem is that it's so quick. It can go viral very quickly. We can be trying to counter it, saying, no, actually, this is the information, but it's almost not believed...by political parties, by candidates, by Elections Canada. Can you elaborate a bit on what we can be doing together to make sure people have the right information about elections, about where they can vote and when they can vote, to make sure we have maximum participation?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Certainly, Madam Chair.

The language is important. We prefer to use the language “inaccurate” information, because we have no way of knowing whether it's misinformation or disinformation. It's simply not accurate information. We promote the idea that Elections Canada is the trusted source of information about the electoral process. That is something that you as candidates and your parties can do. You can promote that in case of doubt, turn to Elections Canada. That is a very important aspect.

We monitor the environment, especially the social media environment. We have relationships with social media platforms. We monitor 67 platforms in 15 languages. It's quite extensive.

The Chair: Thank you for that.

[Translation]

Ms. Gaudreau, the floor is yours for six minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau (Laurentides—Labelle, BQ): It is impressive to know that you monitor 67 platforms in various languages.

So I am going to frame my question a bit more precisely. Personally, I am concerned more specifically with disinformation and cyber threats. I would like to know what we are lacking for working effectively on prevention.

As an aside, I wonder whether laws at the international level are inadequate to properly regulate Internet service suppliers. There have been several committees that have examined the possible contribution of the Group of Five to legislating in order to target any attempted cyber-attack or cyber threat, or even any attempt to spread disinformation.

In your opinion, is this not a tool we should first address before asking everybody to file complaints?

I would ask both witnesses to answer in turn.

Ms. Caroline Simard: Our office does have tools now it can use to do investigative work. It is important to understand the difference between the various roles. For our part, our role includes compliance and enforcement of the Canada Elections Act. With that in mind, as you know, tools have been created and new provisions added that came into force in 2019, for the most part. We were able to test it quietly.

I would like to add a clarification to the comment that was made. It is important to note that our office has received complaints relating to foreign interference, but no official action was taken.

On your question regarding recommendations, I will let deputy commissioner Chénier clarify that for you by giving you a more precise answer.

Mr. Marc Chénier: As Ms. Simard stated, new provisions were brought into effect with the enactment of Bill C-76. This strengthened the system and reduced the possibility of foreign money getting into the system.

On the question of foreign interference, our office's powers are limited to the provisions that Parliament has chosen to...

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: What are you lacking, then?

Mr. Marc Chénier: Mr. Côté, Ms. Simard's predecessor, had recommended that a third component be added to the definition of "undue influence" in the act. Under the act as it now reads, there is undue influence when expenses are incurred to promote or oppose a party or candidate, or when an activity that is carried out in order promote or oppose a party or candidate contravenes a federal or provincial law.

According to Mr. Côté, while it is important to protect freedom of expression in political discourse, the right to freedom of expression and the protection of political dialogue are clearly diminished when foreigners deliberately attempt to sow confusion in people's minds. He had therefore recommended that the act recognize that third way of exercising undue influence: cases where a foreign entity or person sows confusion or intentionally disseminates disinformation.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: I am going to frame my question more precisely.

Would it help you if the G7 countries adopted rules that would determine what is acceptable on the platforms and what is not? Here, we are talking about foreign interference in elections, of course, but there could be rules that relate more generally to platforms that do not obtain people's consent or on which child pornography is found, for example.

The objective is to identify the factors that we should focus on in the action we take.

What are your thoughts, Mr. Perrault?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I made several recommendations in that regard in my report.

What we need, first and foremost, is greater transparency on the part of the digital platforms. We have to understand social media, know what their election advertising policies are, and understand how they deal with misinformation about the electoral process. As I said earlier, we monitor social media, and when we see what we consider to be misinformation or to meet the definition of disinformation, we can alert the major platforms. We have protocols in place for doing this. When cases are submitted to those major platforms, they deal with them in accordance with their policies. However, we do not always know their policies. There should at least be transparency. The platforms can make their own policies, but they should have to divulge them. I think that would help to establish trust.

I also have recommendations for strengthening the rules around disinformation, but I would start with transparency, before anything else.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: My next question is relatively simple: why does the commissioner limit herself to the election period for receiving complaints about foreign interference or for monitoring in this regard?

Ms. Caroline Simard: As the chief electoral officer explained in his remarks, there is no provision of the act that deals with foreign interference. I think you mean, rather, to refer to the provision on undue influence. On that subject, the chief electoral officer had in fact recommended extending the monitoring period, so that it was not limited to the election period. He could tell you about that. My predecessor approved that idea.

The Chair: Thank you.

I would like to point out to all witnesses that they can always answer a question in the official language of their choice, regardless of the language in which they are asked the question.

Ms. Blaney, the floor is yours for six minutes.

[English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney (North Island—Powell River, NDP):

Thank you.

I want to thank all of our witnesses here today. It's always important for us to talk about our election process and what we're doing to make sure we're protecting it from foreign threats.

One of the biggest hurdles is one that all of us as elected officials, and those in trusted positions such as yours, know, and that is getting people to trust the system. That's becoming increasingly hard with so much misinformation. We've seen recently, of course, what happened in the U.S., which was really a deliberate attempt to undermine the electoral system and make something that was concrete seem like it wasn't. That was very concerning. I know all of us are watching that and watching the outcomes of what happens when foreign entities abuse misinformation.

To both of you, through the chair, how can we ensure that accurate, reliable information is shared here in Canada so that misinformation isn't taken advantage of by foreign entities?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, it starts with seeding the environment with correct information. A big part of our work in preparing for an election is to build a repository of information about the voting process that the media and the candidates and the parties can turn to in order to understand what the rules and procedures will be.

The second thing is to monitor what is being said out there, to focus on information about the voting process, which is my mandate, and to respond to any misinformation or inaccurate information by pushing out the correct information. If there is the appearance of an attempt to interfere with the reporting process, I can refer that to the commissioner for investigation. My role is to make sure Canadians have correct information about the voting process.

In my recommendations report, I have made some recommendations about expanding the rules on disinformation. I'd be happy to speak more about that.

[Translation]

Ms. Caroline Simard: From a practical point of view, it is important that you know that in accordance with its role regarding compliance and enforcement of the Canada Elections Act, my office has initiated a dialogue with the platforms. To date, that dialogue has been extremely positive. Some content has been removed form the platforms, at our request, and the evidence has been preserved and communicated. Obviously, I am not talking strictly about foreign interference, but about our investigations in general.

[English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Just to go back to that idea, I guess I'm curious about methods that are being looked at in terms of reporting on which communities are the most vulnerable. What I mean by that, for example, is that indigenous communities, where there is often a sense of distrust already, could be more vulnerable to misinformation around how to vote and what the process is. We also know that new Canadians may not be able to access information through English and French. The other part I would add is that I think rural communities can be under a particular level of concern. Because of their remoteness, often they don't have access to information as readily as other people.

In the work that is being done, how are those communities being considered around those particular vulnerabilities, especially in this area of foreign threats? There is a unique situation there that needs to be addressed. I would love to hear your thoughts on that.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, I think it's a very important point. We know there are communities in Canada that have a knowledge gap about our political institutions. They don't know as much as they perhaps should or could about the voting process and how our institutions work. That makes them more vulnerable. Our outreach activities are geared towards communities that have a knowledge barrier in terms of our voting process.

For example, right now we are working on a pilot project with indigenous communities in northern Ontario to build a civic education program specifically for indigenous Canadians. That's a pilot, and we'll learn from that and see how we can expand it.

We have a range of outreach activities aimed specifically at bridging that gap for certain communities. You're quite right to point out that it makes those Canadians—new Canadians and different groups—more susceptible to being vulnerable to disinformation.

Ms. Caroline Simard: Just so you know, this is not something included within our mandate of compliance and enforcement.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you.

We know that election interference is not just a Canadian problem, so I'm wondering from what other jurisdictions Elections Canada is learning lessons about protecting the integrity of elections, and what lessons are being learned.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Yes, again, Madam Chair, that is a good question.

We work with international partners. One of our good partners is Australia. They had in their most recent election a registry of misinformation. That registry would publish the false statements about the electoral process, and people could refer to that. They felt it was a valuable addition to their program. We're looking into something similar for our elections, so we are exchanging information. At the end of the month, I will be attending a meeting of the OAS—the Organization of American States. I expect to meet people there from Brazil, from the United States and from other jurisdictions in the Americas to deal with these issues.

The Chair: Thank you.

It's Mr. Calkins next, followed by Ms. Sahota.

Mr. Blaine Calkins (Red Deer—Lacombe, CPC): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Confirm for me if you can, Mr. Perrault, that approximately 17 million people voted in the last federal election. Is that correct?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That's correct

Mr. Blaine Calkins: The result from the last election was that on election night the Liberal Party of Canada, which is now the government, fell, I believe, 11 ridings short of a majority. Would you say that's correct?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I believe that's correct.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: If you look at the closest 11—and I'll just say 13, because there were some things that happened afterward— 13 ridings was the number of ridings that the Conservative Party subsequently asked about foreign interference in. In the closest 13 ridings that the Liberal Party could have won, the difference between their candidate winning and the person who did win, in my estimation, falls a little over 20,000 votes. Out of 17 million votes cast, the difference between a majority and a minority government in this country was 0.1% of the ballots cast. How easy is it for a foreign state actor to move the needle by 0.1% in this country?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I don't have an answer to that question. I don't know the effectiveness of any interventions, be they domestic or foreign. I have to say one aspect of the work we do is that we're not equipped to distinguish and we have no means of ascertaining, when we're seeing, for example, debates on social media or criticism of a candidate or a party—and we do see some of that— whether that criticism is originating from a foreign source or a domestic source and whether it's a legitimate part of the actual process or an attempt at foreign interference. That's something that belongs to the national security agencies. Beyond that, it's hard to ascertain what the impact would be. I recognize that the challenge here is how we determine whether any aspect of that would have an impact.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: My former colleague, Kenny Chiu, who lost in the last election, was, prior to the election, very vocally critical of the things that were happening in Hong Kong, and he has alleged quite publicly that the Chinese Communist Party is using software that might not be physically available for everybody to see, but it is using chat groups and so on. These chat groups can get quite large, involving tens of thousands of people. In light of the fact that we've had people report in this country about unofficial Chinese Communist Party police stations or enforcement stations operating in certain parts of the country, how reasonable would it be to assume that these kinds of things are happening so covertly that we wouldn't be aware of them happening or of their significance?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: It's quite possible that some of that is happening, and that is a matter of concern. I think that's why we have national security agencies to look into these matters. I do not have the mandate or capacity to look into that. That said, if there are offences under the act or complaints that the commissioner receives that fall within the parameters of the legislation, then there are ways for her office to look into those. In terms of our agency, it's very difficult to ascertain to what extent there is foreign activity to influence the election.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: You said in your opening remarks that Canadian intelligence services—both CSIS and the Communications Security Establishment—have been in contact, or you are in contact with them. They obviously discuss things with you. What can you publicly share with this committee insofar as your instincts towards the information that you've received from our security establishments go?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Prior to the election, we received briefings that informed at a general level of the trade craft of certain countries and the interest some countries may have in Canadian elections. It's fairly high-level information. They would inform us of anything that was actionable for us. The understanding is that if there is something that relates to the voting process, for instance, that I need to know in order to run the election, then I would need to be made aware of that. I have not been made aware of any of that, any activities in that regard. Beyond that, they are the ones who are concerned with foreign interference.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: I have just a quick question. Would returning to enumeration help you, help your organization, improve the integrity of the election system?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: No, it would not at all. I think, very clearly, moving to enumeration would be to the detriment of the integrity of the election.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Chair: That's excellent. Thank you.

Ms. Sahota, go ahead, please.

Ms. Ruby Sahota (Brampton North, Lib.): Thank you.

I want to thank all the witnesses for being here today once again to help strengthen our democracy.

My first question is for either the Office of the Commissioner or for Elections Canada.

You are a party to this SITE task force that has been created. Even though it may not be your role to collect the information, I'm sure, at least at a high level, you are all briefed about the different threats and the nature of those threats that happen.

A report by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, “Foreign Interference Threats to Canada's Democratic Process”, in 2021 said that although Canada's electoral system is strong, ongoing foreign interference threatens the integrity of democratic institutions and Canadians' trust in them.

It covers foreign interference and different techniques, which go from cybersecurity to elicitation, cultivation, coercion and illicit and corrupt financing. We have been made aware through different reports that when it comes to cybersecurity, countries like Russia, China and Iran are some of the top offenders. What countries other than those three have been involved in more of these covert operations that you have been informed about?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: You've named the countries that come to my mind. I'm sure you'll be hearing from the security agencies that follow us, but I don't have any additional information for the committee.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: No other countries have ever been mentioned, or you haven't been made aware of operations on the ground in any countries other than these three.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Off the top of my head, I don't recall. I want to be careful. It's difficult to remember whether or not the information you have is something that's sensitive. I would not want to put out there any information that I should not be sharing publicly, but quite frankly, there are no countries other than those that come to mind.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: Perhaps we're saying that these are the publicly known threats. You may be informed of other countries' involvement, but you may not be able to share that information with us here today. Is that what you're saying?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Well, yes, and perhaps I should add that the source of a threat is something that is difficult to ascertain, whether that threat is misinformation or cyber-related. I'll let the cyber experts speak to that. It's something that during an event is not immediately apparent. You're seeing incorrect information. Whether it's misinformation or disinformation, whether it's foreign or domestic, it's just incorrect information, and we need to deal with it. The same is true, from our perspective, with cyber-attacks. We need to have walls. We need to have protections.

In terms of who's behind those cyber-attacks, this is, of course, of interest to Canada, but in terms of our role, the important thing is that we protect our infrastructure.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: It's not just cyber-attacks but other types of operations that could be influencing. If not other countries, could you state whether there are perhaps third parties or entities located in other countries that come to mind?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I'm not aware of any, Madam Chair.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: Okay. My next question is about social media companies.

Many social media companies have signed the declaration on electoral integrity, which commits, among other things, to addressing disinformation. We know algorithmic transparency is an issue when it comes to these social media companies. A lot of those algorithms originate from the U.S. Many of these social media companies originate from there as well.

What impact do you think that has in terms of their being considered foreign influence on elections?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Again, this is a bit of a laced question. [Translation]

We have to be careful: the fact that there are activities from outside Canada does not necessarily mean there has been interference. Under the Canada Elections Act, the concept of interference refers to very specific offences. So it is hard to untangle all the elements of your question.

I think Canadians would have more confidence in the electoral process if they were able to know what the social media platforms' policies are in relation to how misinformation, disinformation and illegal content are handled. At present, it is a black box. We have protocols in place for letting them know our concerns, but we do not get the transparency from them that we would hope for and that would assure us that actions are being taken to reduce the impact of misinformation or disinformation.

[English]

Ms. Ruby Sahota: I've run out of time, but I just want to thank you for all your hard work in making sure elections are run fairly and smoothly.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Ms. Gaudreau, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Given the short time I have, I will keep to very precise questions.

My first question is for the commissioner.

Ms. Simard, you said that you work primarily on the basis of public complaints. You also said just now that there had been interference, but there had been no complaints during the last two parliaments.

So I am wondering: if there are no complaints, what type of monitoring to you do? I imagine you are going to do some fine-tuning, inspecting or more analyzing of what there is.

Ms. Caroline Simard: In answer to your question, I would say that the act gives me discretion. It is important to understand the parameters within which this discretion can be exercised and to know that this discretion has been exercised in the past. You will find that information in my predecessor's public reports.

That is what I can tell you at this time.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: You said that the presence of activities or entities from outside Canada's borders could significantly increase the complexity of an investigation.

We are here to help you. What might you need in order for your investigations to be less complex?

Ms. Caroline Simard: As I said, our mandate is set out in the act, we have tools now, and we are able to do work now.

What is important to understand is that our mandate is limited to those provisions and that framework, and we have to work in collaboration with partners. That is what we are doing now and will continue to do.

Since you seem to be offering us a hand by asking us what improvements might be made, I would say that a recommendation was made previously by my predecessor regarding the definitions and terms used in the act. The deputy commissioner could given you details on that.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Since I have only a few seconds left, I will invite you to tell us in writing what things you are lacking at present and what you might need, Commissioner. Similarly, Mr. Perrault, we would really like to know what comes out of your exchange of ideas with Australia and your upcoming meetings with Brazil, among others, in order to include that information in our report.

The Chair: Thank you.

That is a good invitation, which I will also issue to all the witnesses. If anyone has additional information to provide to the committee, you need only send it to the clerk of the committee.

Ms. Blaney, the floor is yours for two and a half minutes. [English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you, Madam Chair.

My last question for both of you is really on the pre-election period. We're hearing a lot more about the due diligence that needs to be done in the pre-election period. We can't ever overestimate how foreign influence will come through the process.

I'm just wondering if you could talk a little about what would be more beneficial around the pre-election period in terms of the services you provide and how they could assist us in building Canadians' trust in the systems we have here for our elections.

Thank you.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, if I may, it's important for us to increasingly talk about what we do to protect the integrity of our electoral process. This is something we certainly began in the last election. I think it was quite successful. We had a lot of information about postal ballots because of concerns with those.

It's also important to go beyond that and to explain to Canadians why they should trust elections. We have extraordinary safeguards in our procedures. They would know that it is a very transparent process, if only they knew more about it.

I think we have a responsibility to share that information with the Canadian population, of course, through the media and through MPs and candidates. That is certainly a way forward when we talk about work between elections, so that we seed the ground with healthy information about the voting process and not let the space be filled with conspiracy theories or inaccurate information.

[Translation]

Ms. Caroline Simard: My answer would be that it is important for Canadians to submit their complaints to us. For information, in the last general election, 13 situations involving foreign interference were brought to our attention in 16 complaints, while our total caseload came to 4,000. So it is important for Canadians to communicate with us.

In terms of the complexity of the investigations, you have to understand that it is all a matter of evidence. Because we operate on the basis of tangible facts, it is important that we be provided with those tangible facts.

[English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney: My time is wrapping up, but I will say again that it is by interacting with our systems that we build trust, so I think it is important for the pre-election component. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Cooper, you have four minutes.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I will direct my question to whoever is in a position to answer.

The Canada Elections Act prohibits a third party from using foreign funds for regulated purposes, as you noted.

Let me just give you a hypothetical. A third party can spend $1.5 million. They receive $1.5 million from domestic sources and a U.S. entity donates $1.5 million. If they spend $1.5 million in an election, what happens?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: It's a hypothetical. We may not have a window on the historical assets of that third party. A third party is anybody in Canada who is not a registered party, the electoral district association or the candidate. Essentially, it's everybody.

We don't have visibility on the history of its assets. It does need to report, and that was an improvement brought in—

Mr. Michael Cooper: It needs to report monies that are spent for regulated purposes, right?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That's right, but it—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Then what's the enforcement mechanism?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: If it reports that it has used that $1.5 million—and very few of them reach that amount because, to be clear, the vast majority spend small amounts—it will have to report the source of the expenditure, of the funding for that money.

A significant portion could be its own funds, so we have no mechanism—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Those funds could be foreign funds.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Those funds could be foreign funds. That's why I made recommendations that third parties—

Mr. Michael Cooper: That's even though the act says there's a prohibition on the use of foreign funds. You're saying that doesn't really mean much.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I wouldn't go that far, but I'd say it's incomplete. Until we have a grasp on the use of an entity's own funds, I think the act is incomplete and it needs to be addressed.

Mr. Michael Cooper: I want to ask another question.

I think, Madame Simard, you mentioned there was no significant difference between the number of issues giving rise to complaints containing allegations of foreign interference in the 43rd election and that in the 44th, but what were the numbers? If there wasn't a significant increase, what were the numbers?

Ms. Caroline Simard: I'll ask the deputy commissioner to answer this question.

Thank you.

Mr. Marc Chénier: I believe for the 43rd general election there were 10 complaints involving some component that could be foreign interference. For the last general election there were 13 complaints. Again, those are allegations. In many cases they don't fall within the prohibited conduct in the act. It depends again on what the prohibited conduct is and what the allegation is. Often we cannot do anything with the complaint.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Chair: Mr. Cooper, I enjoy having you on this committee. You always give me time back, so I appreciate that.

Mr. Turnbull, you have four minutes.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull (Whitby, Lib.): Thanks, Madam Chair, and thanks to all the witnesses for being here today.

Mr. Perrault, maybe I'll start with you. It's good to see you again.

In response to Ms. Blaney's comment about misinformation, I think you indicated that you're constantly monitoring it and that you're putting out messages to correct the misinformation that's out there. Obviously, this is a concern to all of us. The prevalence of misinformation and disinformation out there is quite troubling.

Would you like to comment on the impact of parties' attacking or undermining of our democratic institutions, such as Elections Canada? How do those things impact their ability—your ability—to be a trusted source of information?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That's a very generic question, and I'll respond very generically. I welcome the support of all parties to reinforce the trust in the electoral process. It's a partnership we have with Canadians to make sure people trust the electoral process.

If parties have concerns about aspects of the electoral process, then of course there should be debate about that. There are avenues for that, but it's critical that we all work together to reinforce our democratic institutions.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Mr. Perrault, you said in your opening remarks that there was no foreign interference in the last two general elections, which is great to hear. How do you know that?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I said there were no breaches of our IT infrastructure. That I know for a fact. We have cyber-attacks every day, as does every institution. We have no mechanism for knowing whether they are foreign or domestic. I'm assuming that in large part they are foreign, but that we're not specifically targeted. We have had no breach, and we have had no interference with our operations.

That is not to say there is no foreign interest in Canadian elections and the political debates and the political outcomes, but these are areas that ultimately go beyond the reach of Elections Canada.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Okay. I guess if we're talking about pre-election periods in a minority Parliament, they're a bit more extended.

I'm interested in how the undermining of our democracy was attempted during the convoy we saw. We saw and heard media reports multiple times about how there was a significant amount of funding coming across the border to support that convoy, which had a stated intention of overthrowing the government and which was really trying to undermine policies that a democratically elected government had been elected to implement.

I'm wondering if you can make any comments on how we can protect against that? It's a form of foreign and domestic interference, I would say. It's foreign-sponsored domestic interference, and it's pre-election. What are we doing in that area?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: This is an issue that's much broader than electoral administration. Certainly we monitor beyond the election period what I described with respect to the voting process, so if there was incorrect information on the voting process during the convoy or in any other circumstance, we would respond to that.

On the point you made about foreign funding, I read the papers, as we all do. I don't have any definitive knowledge about the source of the funding for the convoy, but certainly it was an illustration of how, should there be foreign funding of a group or an individual, we need to have measures to prevent foreign funding from seeping into the activities of third parties. I certainly hear agreement across the board.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you, Mr. Perrault.

The Chair: That's excellent. That brings to an end our time together for the first panel. We want to thank Madame Simard, Mr. Perrault, Mr. Caron and Mr. Chénier for joining us today.

If you have any additional information on the study that you would like to share with our committee, please share it with the clerk, and we'll make sure it is shared with all members.

With that, I thank you for the tremendous work you do and I wish you a good day.

(Pause)

[Translation]

The Chair: We will now resume the meeting. [English]

We have with us for the second panel, Michelle Tessier, deputy director of operations with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, also known as CSIS. We also have Madam Alia Tayyeb, deputy chief of signals intelligence with the Communications Security Establishment, also known as CSE. We will be starting with four minutes of opening comments from Madam Tessier, then we will continue with Madam Tayyeb.

Welcome to PROC.

Madam Tessier, the floor is yours.

Ms. Michelle Tessier (Deputy Director, Operations, Canadian Security Intelligence Service): Thank you very much.

Madam Chair, members of the committee, good afternoon.

As was mentioned, my name is Michelle Tessier, and I am the deputy director of operations for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

[Translation]

Thank you for the invitation to appear before you today to talk about this important subject, foreign interference threats to our elections.

[English]

I would like to begin by defining what foreign interference is and what it is not. Foreign interference is not the normal diplomatic and public relations activity that is carried out by foreign states to influence policy outcomes. Those activities, when they take place overtly, are acceptable activities in Canada, even when conducted vigorously. They are not foreign interference.

[Translation]

Foreign interference activities are different. These are activities that cross a line. They attempt to undermine our democratic processes or threaten our citizens.

[English]

In the CSIS Act, Parliament defined foreign influenced activities, which is another term for foreign interference, as “activities within or relating to Canada that are detrimental to the interests of Canada and are clandestine or deceptive or involve a threat to any person”.

To be clear, foreign interference is a covert and malign activity undertaken by a foreign state to advance its national interests to the detriment of Canada's interests. It often targets Canadians, as well as our democratic institutions and processes. These activities take aim at Canada's economy, policy process, communities and media.

Today we are discussing how foreign interference impacts our democracy. It targets all levels of government, be it federal, provincial or municipal, as well as political parties, candidates, elected officials and their staff and elections themselves. States may seek to influence who becomes an official candidate and even electoral outcomes.

Indeed, individuals may be threatened or made to fear reprisals if they fail to comply with publicly supporting a particular candidate or contributing funds to a foreign state's preferred party or candidate. While state actors may use coercive techniques to achieve their objectives, they may also use flattery, promise compensation or appeal to an individual's sense of pride towards another country to elicit the desired behaviour.

We are also increasingly seeing states leverage media, including more traditional and community-based media in addition to social media, to spread disinformation or run influence campaigns designed to confuse or divide public opinion or interfere in healthy public debate and political discourse.

As a member of the security and intelligence threats to the elections task force, known as SITE, CSIS worked closely with partners in efforts to raise awareness and assess foreign interference threats against the 2019 and 2021 federal elections. This included providing classified intelligence briefings on foreign interference to cleared political party members.

In both 2019 and 2021, the panel of senior civil servants responsible for the critical election incident public protocol determined that the Government of Canada did not detect foreign interference that threatened Canada's ability to have a free and fair election and that warranted public communication.

Last year, ahead of the 2021 federal election, CSIS released a public report entitled “Foreign Interference Threats to Canada's Democratic Process” to better inform Canadians of this serious threat. As this report shows, foreign states target our democratic process to covertly influence Canadian public policy and public opinion and ultimately undermine our democracy, but there are ways to help protect against this threat. Our report communicated some strategies Canadians can take to identify and resist foreign interference.

Both the RCMP and CSIS have phone numbers and online reporting mechanisms that are monitored 24-7 for anyone who would like to report a threat to national security, including foreign interference.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Tessier. Four minutes fly by. Madam Tayyeb, we'll go over to you.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb (Deputy Chief of Signals Intelligence (SIGINT), Communications Security Establishment): Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee, for this invitation to appear today.

My name is Alia Tayyeb. My pronouns are she and her. I'm the deputy chief of signals intelligence for the Communications Securi ty Establishment. CSE is Canada's national cybersecurity and foreign intelligence agency.

[Translation]

I am pleased to be here today with my colleague Michelle Tessier from CSIS. Today, I will provide you with an update from CSE’s perspective on the threat of foreign interference to our electoral system.

[English]

I’ll begin by outlining some of the key trends we have observed. To complement Michelle's remarks, I'll focus on what we see from a cyber perspective.

On Friday we published our “National Cyber Threat Assessment”, more commonly known as the NCTA. The NCTA highlights that online foreign influence activities have become the new normal, with adversaries seeking to influence elections and impact international discourse related to current events.

We assess that misinformation, disinformation and mal-information, or MDM, propagated by state-sponsored cyber-threat actors represents an ongoing, persistent threat to Canadians. Adversary states constantly circulate and amplify MDM that supports their interests. Further, we've seen that state-sponsored cyber-threat activity is impacting Canadians by targeting both individuals and Canada's economy at large. Individuals are targeted, including diaspora populations and activists in Canada. They may also target Canadians' personal information. Another method state-sponsored actors utilize is targeting Canada's economic value. This may be done through intellectual property theft and foreign intelligence operations.

[Translation]

Canada’s active participation in the international community and membership in key organizations such as NATO and the G7 almost certainly make Canadians a target for online foreign influence campaigns.

Between 2015 and 2020, the vast majority of cyber threat activity affecting democratic processes could be attributed to state-sponsored cyber threat actors. Russia, China, and Iran were very likely responsible for most of the foreign state-sponsored cyber threat activity against democratic processes worldwide.

[English]

In terms of what we're doing to prevent and defend against these threats, we collect foreign intelligence on the activities of foreign states, including any foreign interference activities directed at Canada's democratic institutions or processes.

We provide cybersecurity and information assurance, including providing advice and defences against malicious state actors who may seek to use cyber as a tool for foreign interference. For example, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, we have observed numerous Russian-backed disinformation campaigns online, including those designed to discredit and spread disinformation about NATO allies and false narratives about Canada's involvement in the conflict. We shared this information on Twitter as part of the Government of Canada's efforts to help inform Canadians.

In addition, we can conduct active and defensive cyber-operations to disrupt hostile activities from foreign states, which could include disrupting foreign interference activities. We also provide technical and operational assistance to CSIS and the RCMP as they seek to identify, prevent and disrupt foreign interference.

[Translation]

CSE and the Cyber Centre that it heads have also worked directly with Elections Canada for several years providing cyber security advice and guidance. This partnership continues today, and we continue to support their efforts to ensure secure elections.

[English]

I know that later this week you will be hearing from the security and intelligence threats to elections task force, or SITE for short, so I'll only briefly outline CSE's role in SITE.

In the lead-up to and during the 2021 federal election, CSE, CSIS, Global Affairs Canada and the RCMP worked together closely as part of the SITE task force to monitor for foreign threats and interference with electoral processes in Canada.

[Translation]

Outside of the context of an election, our intelligence work continues and provides insights to partners with respect to foreign interference, and our cyber security work continues to prevent and defend against cyber intrusions that could enable foreign interference.

[English]

Members, I can assure— [Translation]

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Tayyeb.

[English]

Time flies, I know, but we look forward to hearing more from you during the question-and-answer period.

Mr. Calkins, welcome. You have six minutes.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses. I really appreciate your testimony. It begs more questions than I have time for, so I'll get straight to it.

The Communist Party of China passed its national intelligence law in 2017, which requires Chinese organizations and citizens anywhere in the world to assist with the Communist Party's state intelligence work. Would you agree with that?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Yes, we absolutely do agree with that.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: In September, an article in The Globe and Mail exposed an extensive network of Chinese police stations operating not only in Canada but also in other democratic nations around the world. We also know that the Government of Canada had to limit the Chinese Communist Party's use of Operation Fox- Hunt in 2015, due to fears that it was used to intimidate dissidents in Canada.

My question to you is this: What ongoing measures are your organizations taking to monitor this threat? I don't know if you followed the line of questioning I had with the previous guests, but 17 million Canadians cast ballots in the last election. The difference between a majority Liberal government and a minority Liberal government in the 13 closest ridings was a mere 20,000-some votes. I'm going to ask you this, even though it might not be directly related to your mandate: Can foreign state actors, which I think pose a different threat from third-party funding coming from other countries, move the needle 20,000 to 30,000 votes during a federal election campaign?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Perhaps, Madam Chair, I can begin, and I'll certainly turn to my colleague, Alia, as well, for any comments she may have.

If I address the initial question about the overseas police stations, as I'm sure you can appreciate, I can't go into the operational details of the service's work, but I can say that we are using all the authorities we have to look at any potential threat to our communities. It is very important for us to ensure that our communities in Canada feel protected and are not the victims of any threat action towards them or any foreign actor trying to threaten them or their families back home, which we know is of concern. Obviously, this remains a priority for us.

In terms of foreign state actors influencing any elections, I'm not at liberty to say whether or not certain numbers could be influenced that way. I can say, as we have said in our public reports and other venues, that we are very concerned about foreign influence activities against our democratic institutions and against our elections, and we see these activities increasing. We are working with our stakeholders and other Government of Canada partners to increase awareness of this threat.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: In 2019 it was discovered that a spy from the communist Chinese government was recruited to run the constituency of an Australian parliamentarian. Despite our geographic distance from China, there are worries that China interferes with our politics here domestically, of course. I'll use the examples of former ambassador John McCallum's intervention on behalf of Meng Wanzhou, as well as China's praising Canadian senators who voted against the Uighur genocide motion.

Are there current parliamentarians or senators, volunteers in various campaigns or staff members working for members of Parliament or senators whom Parliament should be made aware of, who could potentially be compromised? If there are any, how would you communicate that, and who would get to know that?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: As I mentioned in my opening comments, we are very concerned about the targeting. We know there is certainly a desire to target elected officials at all levels of government, municipal, provincial and federal. We work to provide defensive briefings, and we certainly encourage individuals who have concerns or questions to reach out to us. We engage quite a bit in stakeholder awareness and in defensive briefings when these types of concerns are raised.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: In order to mitigate....

I'm sorry, Ms. Tayyeb. Do you have something you want to add to that? Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I just thought I would echo what Michelle was saying in that regard. We work very closely, and we did, as part of the SITE task force as well in the lead-up to the election, the four agencies together, ensure that we were providing regular briefings to political parties. We also work very closely with the House of Commons to ensure that any and all information we should be sharing with them in the way of threat information about foreign interference is shared.

Thank you.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Given the nature of your comments about the tools you have available to you, Ms. Tessier, in regard to the increased level of foreign state interference, are there any new tools or any other authorities you think you would need, either of you, in order to continue to protect Canada's democratic institutions?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: We have highlighted in the past that we feel that the CSIS Act was written at a time, 1984, that has likely not kept up with the modern, complex threat landscape and technological advances, so we are constantly looking at our authorities and at the tools we require.

One example I would give is our ability to use and assess data. We are in a world of increased data. Although changes were made to the CSIS Act to enable us to look at data and manage datasets, we still feel that, again, with evolving technology and our authorities, there is probably discussion to be had in terms of CSIS's ability to assess data. Another example—

The Chair: Thank you. I'm sorry. I know our time flies by so quickly. You can always provide us this information, especially when it comes to input that we should be aware of to help you do the important work you do.

Mr. Turnbull, you have six minutes.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thanks to both our witnesses for being with us today. I found your opening remarks really helpful.

Ms. Tessier, I'll start with you. In your opening remarks, you said that CSIS did not detect foreign interference that needed to be disclosed. Just going back to the critical election incident public protocol, it sounds like that wasn't used.

I wonder if you could speak to the fact that there can be a potential threat that did not meet the threshold under that protocol. Can you explain that a bit more for the committee?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Certainly. As we've mentioned—and I believe there will be members of the SITE task force appearing later this week—we, as well as other government partners such as CSE, Global Affairs Canada and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, participate in SITE. It is really a combination of all our intelligence that is used to inform the critical panel if there is any type of foreign interference we feel could potentially affect the integrity of the overall election. In this case, there was not, but that is the work we do on a constant basis. The SITE group briefs the panel on a regular basis in terms of the incidents we see during an electoral period.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you for that clarification.

We can probably infer that there are potential threats in our electoral process. It's just that they're not going to impact or make a material difference on the election integrity. Is that correct?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: That's correct. As we've mentioned, we see activity of foreign interference or attempts at foreign interference in terms of trying to influence, but not enough to have met the threshold of impacting the overall electoral integrity.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you. I'll go to Ms. Tayyeb now.

Many social companies have signed what's called the declaration on electoral integrity, which, among other things, commits them to address MDM, as you call it.

We know that algorithmic transparency is an issue; it's been talked about quite often. The algorithms they use predominantly originate, as far as I understand it, from U.S., i.e. foreign-based, companies. What impact do you think this has, Ms. Tayyeb, in terms of being considered foreign influence on an election?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: We work very closely with social media companies all around the world. We did so in a collaborative fashion as part of the SITE task force as well.

In terms of addressing your question about the U.S. origin of those algorithms, we definitely work with U.S. companies. As well, we will advise them of any information or any interference we suspect to have taken place. We have a very collaborative relationship with them. They've been very open to addressing those concerns. As you pointed out, they have very robust policies in and around proper use of those platforms, and we've found them very responsive to that.

Maybe I'll just clarify. When we here at CSE are looking at foreign interference and foreign influence activities, we're mostly looking at state actor activities. It's not to say that a foreign organization couldn't also be engaged in such activities. In the case of the U.S., we've found very strong partnerships with those companies, and we've been able to work with them in a collaborative fashion.

Thank you.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: One recent concern that stands out in my mind is Canada Proud tweeting @ElonMusk, hours after he became the owner of Twitter, to ask about Bill C-11, which we know was the subject of significant disinformation in the last election.

What role do social media companies have in being responsible actors during and leading up to elections?

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: I'm sorry. Yes, I was directing that to you, Ms. Tayyeb.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I'll leave some room for Michelle to answer, in case she has anything else to add.

We think they play a very strong role in this domain. As practitioners in the security and intelligence community, it's important for us not to be seen to be interfering at all in what is healthy discourse, even when we don't like it. We definitely see activities that are not foreign state directed as being well within the purview of responsible industry to take care of. Certainly, our role in that is to advise them and provide them the information they need in order to protect themselves and to protect their audiences, but we absolutely believe that they are well placed to address those threats.

Thank you.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thanks.

Ms. Tessier, would you like to add anything?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: No, I find Alia answered quite well.

I would just reiterate that we work in a democracy. Managing social media, knowing that it is very much a tool used by foreign actors, is, of course, of concern, and we encourage awareness and liaison with these platforms so that they recognize foreign interference and are able to act on it.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Would you say, Ms. Tayyeb, that the majority of the MDM that's out there is propagated through social media?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I would say that it certainly is a very large vector we have in society these days. It's not exclusive to social media, but certainly, since the very robust propagation of social media throughout our society, we've seen an increase in those types of activities.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Ms. Gaudreau, the floor is yours for six minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses for being here. I am learning a lot from this testimony. You know that just before you, we heard from the commissioner of Canada elections, the deputy commissioner, and the chief electoral officer. I asked them a question that I would like to ask you now, and I will have more after that. This is about the present legislative situation.

The monitoring you do is crucial. It is not only preventive, but also remedial; we don't want to have to get to that point, but, things being what they are, it is a possibility.

Are the laws in our country inadequate to regulate Internet service providers and online platforms? That is a subject we have been discussing for several years. There have been talks and consultations on this subject among the Group of Five, but we have not yet heard anything about any common legislative action being taken by the members of the Group of Five or the G7, for example.

What should we do to establish the priorities among our efforts in this regard, so that you could do your job better?

I would like to hear comments from both witnesses in turn.

Ms. Michelle Tessier: We are constantly reviewing the powers and tools we have. As I said earlier, the technology is evolving, as are the laws and the complexity of the environment. We are in constant discussions with other departments or agencies of the Government of Canada and with our allies to understand what might be useful for this country.

Obviously, we respect the fact that decisions relating to legislation and changes to policies belong to the political sphere. We simply send our recommendations or opinions. That said, we are always on the lookout for anything that could be useful for us here in Canada, based on experiences that other countries may have had.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: For my part, I am going to answer your question in English, in order to be more precise.

[English]

I agree with what Michelle said. Our authorities are in a constant state of evolution. We have very robust engagement with partners across government in order to make sure they have the information we collect with respect to foreign threats to Canadian electoral processes but also in terms of manipulation of societal dialogue.

That said, regulation in that vein is not the purview of CSE. We'd be happy to provide advice to our government colleagues, but we ourselves don't have a part in the regulation of telecommunications or social media.

Thank you. [Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: You have given me some reassurance, nonetheless, when it comes to election interference. Certainly it is concerning to hear about malicious acts, clandestine activities, or even flattery.

Does what we see today in terms of cyber security and cyber threats give you cause for concern for the coming decades, if we look at it from a global perspective?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: If I may, I will answer that question first.

[English]

From a CSE perspective, certainly we see that our adversaries are very well resourced. They're dedicated to their strategic interests. We have a lot of work to do to ensure that we can catch up and that we can continue to both identify and counter the threats they pose.

That said, we have a very robust set of authorities, at least at CSE, as they relate to a foreign intelligence mandate, our cybersecurity mandate, and furthermore, more recently, in 2019, we were given the authority to conduct both defensive and active cyber operations, which I think added significantly to the toolset Canada has in order to defend against these threats.

We also have very robust partnerships with our Canadian colleagues in the security and intelligence community and across government, in addition to robust partnerships with our Five Eyes and additional colleagues across the world.

I think we're well positioned to defend against these threats, but we need to make sure we are constantly evolving to match the threat. As you know, the cyber domain is increasing exponentially, and it is incumbent on us to ensure that we are constantly reviewing our authorities and our tactics in order to make sure we can continue to defend Canadians.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: In short, the answer is neither yes nor no; the important thing is to adapt to what is coming.

Ms. Tessier, can you tell us quickly what your thoughts are?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: I would add that a lot of information continues to circulate on the Internet. People have to protect themselves and be suspicious of the emails they receive. People have to stay up to date on threats and pay attention to the information they publish on the Internet themselves, to avoid making themselves vulnerable. It is always a question of education, because the actors use very sophisticated techniques that are constantly evolving.

The Chair: Thank you.

Ms. Blaney, the floor is yours for six minutes. [English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Of course, I thank the folks who are here testifying. I really appreciate the work you do. I'm learning a lot today.

As we're having this discussion, I can't help but reflect on how important it is that voters and institutions be protected from any threat to democracy, and how important it is to continue that work. I thank you for being part of it.

I will come to Ms. Tayyeb first and go to Ms. Tessier if she has anything to add. In a July 2021 update on threats to democracy, the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security wrote that between 2015 and 2020, cyber-threat activity was directed at voters more often than at political parties in elections. Based on that information, how do you think an everyday Canadian should understand this? We're hearing that these threats are becoming more and more sophisticated. What sorts of actions should voters take to ensure that they are viewing correct information about democracy in Canada?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: It's an excellent question, and it's really core to how we see this threat, which is to really do our utmost to ensure that Canadians are aware of the threat, that they're aware of the tactics that are used, and that they know what to expect when they are viewing material online. That is, in large measure, why we've published cyber-threats to democratic institutions in previous years. The 2021 one was, I believe, our third.

Our first line of defence is to ensure that Canadians have as much information as possible about the tactics that are used and the adversaries that we name, specific adversaries we see as most prolific in this space. We outline the tactics they use, including spreading disinformation about the political process, sowing divisive seeds in our social media and casting aspersions on the democratic process as a whole.

We feel it's important that Canadians receive as much information about that as possible. We regularly reach out to Canadians, through either media releases or Twitter, in order to emphasize those messages as much as possible.

Thank you very much.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: I appreciate that, but I also represent in my riding a lot of rural and remote communities that often have limited access to services. I'm just curious if there are any particular strategies or recommendations that you're providing for different community groups—rural communities, remote communities that have limited access to connectivity—or looking at different groups across our country that are more marginalized. I'm just wondering if there are specific strategies or recommendations around that, especially in terms of promoting democracy. We know that sometimes these groups are the groups that don't participate in democracy as often or as fulsomely. I'm just curious about that process.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: It's an excellent question. It's one that we talk a lot about at CSE and the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security: how to reach more Canadians, how to increase the reach of our media campaigns and how to ensure we're reaching communities across Canada, including remote and northern communities. We are developing ways to do that in a better way, but we realize there is a lot of work to do in that regard.

Thank you.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: My next question is that, of course, when we look at this process, there has to be a balance between what we expect voters to do to inform themselves and understand and how government should ensure that accurate information is available to the public. How do you envision this task being balanced between the two? Ms. Michelle Tessier: Perhaps I can start, and Alia can answer after that.

A lot of it is awareness and communicating to Canadians, to various communities, that, if there's any concern, if they see any information that they feel is questionable, and certainly if they feel threatened, our RCMP colleagues and other law enforcement partners are certainly available to address any potential threats.

It's really very much an awareness issue, so that Canadians know that they can address any questions or concerns to us, to the RCMP or to Elections Canada. We can answer questions and create awareness, so people feel they have the information they need and are well informed when it comes to the elections and their ability to vote.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: Thank you.

I don't want to speak on behalf of Elections Canada, but I worked with them during the election campaign and I'm aware that this is something they are also seized with by improving their outreach to communities about the importance of participating in the democratic process. They may be able to offer more information on that as well.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you. I have only a couple of seconds, so I will cede those.

The Chair: Thank you always, Ms. Blaney.

Next we will go to Mr. Cooper and then Ms. O'Connell. Mr. Cooper, you have five minutes.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the officials. I will direct my questions to whichever official is best positioned to answer them.

The first question I'll ask is this: Did the Chinese communist regime interfere in the last federal election?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Yes. As I mentioned earlier, we know that China, among other countries, tries to target elected officials at all levels of government to promote its own national interests and to encourage individuals to speak or act, if you will, as proxies on behalf of the Communist Party of China.

There is even open information that talks about these types of activities and their use of proxy agents in other countries who they will use to represent their interests. That remains of concern to us in terms of its influence activities and how it tries to manipulate some individuals to work in their interests against Canada's national interests.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Would it be fair to say that it's threatening and intimidating individuals on Canadian soil?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: It's fair to say that it would use a number of techniques, including threats to communities here, including using proxy agents so that you don't necessarily know it's the Government of China behind it, and including attempts to use community resources. It's fair to say that there are a number of techniques it would use to promote its own national interests against Canada's.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Would it be fair to say that this is occurring on a fairly widespread basis?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: I hesitate to give a frequency. Again, I would say we are increasingly concerned. We have seen, as was mentioned earlier, the laws the Chinese Communist Party has passed, making it obligatory for everybody in China, including the private sector, to work on behalf of the government.

We are seeing increasing authoritarianism, if I can allow myself to say that word, in terms of the Communist Party of China's strategies in this regard.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Can you speak to the use of Chinese language media by the regime?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: We are concerned about the use of media by many of the hostile state actors, including China. We know there are attempts. We've talked about disinformation and misinformation attempts using all types of media. The media are very much a victim or a tool that is used for foreign interference.

Mr. Michael Cooper: [Inaudible—Editor] content farms?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: I'm sorry. I didn't hear the question.

Mr. Michael Cooper: What about content farms, content mills and information saturation?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: I would say all available vectors in media would be able to be exploited by hostile state actors, so all types of media are certainly vulnerable to exploitation.

The Chair: Thank you.

Ms. O'Connell, you have five minutes.

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell (Pickering—Uxbridge, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the witnesses.

I want to follow up on that line of questioning in terms of using media outlets. I believe, Ms. Tessier, you mentioned earlier that foreign state actors often use local media to spread disinformation or misinformation. You said just now, in that exchange—I'm paraphrasing here, of course—that all types of media could and would be used.

For CSIS, or CSE or any Canadian agency, for example, if a so- called media group like Canada Proud or Rebel News started using Chinese or Russian types of disinformation in their local disinformation or misinformation campaigns, what mechanisms would you have to then tell Canadians that this local source of information is being used by foreign state actors like China or Russia?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: I want to highlight what we said earlier, that we respect. Obviously, we are in a democracy. We respect the

media, and we do not want to be seen as interfering in the media. I want to underline that. That is certainly not an activity the service would undertake.

Without being able to get into great detail, we would look from an investigative perspective to try to determine what the nature of the threat was. Of course, we'd use the whole gamut of tools at our disposal.

I go back to the importance of working with the community and how important it is for us to work with stakeholders in the community to protect the community. That's why it is important for community members to be able to reach out to us should they feel that this type of activity is going on. It is certainly not the service that will be monitoring all media.

I want to be careful here. We recognize the right in a democracy to have the freedom of expression that exists, but we are concerned when our mandate is called into question. That is when hostile states working in a clandestine fashion are working against Canadian national interests or threatening the community. Our mandate is quite defined in that respect. I would want to reassure the committee that it is where our focus would be.

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell: Thank you.

Following up on that, isn't that part of foreign state actors' attempts to undermine democracy in places like Canada, and, I'm sure, in other countries as well? It's to undermine democracy, our pillars of democracy and our trust in institutions. Foreign interference and the messages they send are not necessarily, “We like this person or that person or this party”; it's to sow doubt in our institutions. For example—I don't know—the Governor of the Bank of Canada, the local media that asked tough questions of certain parties. Isn't it a factor that it's not very clear-cut support of this gov‐

ernment over that government, but foreign interference is to sow doubt in our democratic institutions? That could take form in many different messages.

Ms. Michelle Tessier: You are absolutely correct. That is very much one of the vectors used to, as an example, try to find a divisive issue in society and amplify it one way or the other.

I'm pleased to say that the increased awareness and discussion about foreign interference highlights how society is becoming much more attuned to the threat it represents.

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell: Did you see COVID as an opportunity? You mentioned taking a divisive issue and turning that against governments. For example, Canada Proud was criticized for spreading misinformation about vaccine rollouts. Did you see an increase in disinformation or sowing doubt in Canadian society? Did you see that vacuum open or increase during COVID?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Again, focusing on our mandate, if I look back to the threats to the security of Canada, what we saw, certainly during COVID, was interest by hostile state actors to try to spread disinformation. We saw that from hostile state actors. We also saw attempts to conduct espionage against some of the vaccine work that was being done, so we undertook—

The Chair: Thank you. I'm sorry; that flew by really fast, but the clerk is always so efficient, so I know it was five minutes.

[Translation]

Ms. Gaudreau, the floor is yours for two and a half minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you, Madam Chair. My question is very simple and it is for Ms. Tessier.

You talked about the importance of education and raising awareness. For the purposes of the report we will be writing, I would like to hear your comments and suggestions as to how we could go about doing this. You have given me some reassurance, nonetheless, by explaining all the upstream work you are doing.

Ms. Michelle Tessier: In our public report, we describe a number of techniques used by states that are hostile to Canadian interests. They include what we call cultivation. That is when individuals cultivate relationships by offering gifts, paid travel or that kind of thing.

Our report also talks about cyber security. For example, it explains how to protect yourself online and describes the kind of emails that you should be suspicious of.

We also offer advice to individuals, for example, in cases where they feel they are being asked a lot of questions about a number of subjects and as a result they wonder whether they are giving too much information.

Our report provides advice based on the techniques used.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: What I see is that there needs to be some alignment with the other commissioners who deal with issues relating to gifts, requests, or the ways in which certain people try to achieve their ends. I get the feeling that we need awareness and prevention programs. We have them at the House of Commons, for example to combat harassment. In addition to elected representatives and their staff, I get the feeling that there should be awareness programs for the general public in the near future.

Ms. Tayyeb, do you have a comment to add quickly?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I would like to add to what Ms. Tessier said. When it comes to cyber security, we publish a lot of advice, for various people, about how to protect themselves. I can list a few of them.

[English]

We counsel people about using difficult-to-guess passwords specifically. Michelle mentioned caution about—

The Chair: Thank you. I was trying to help you get one out. You can send the rest to us in writing to the clerk.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I will do that.

The Chair: I'm sure Madame Gaudreau and the committee would love to hear that.

Ms. Blaney, you have two and a half minutes.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you.

I'm going to leave this question open to both of you. I'll just let you decide who answers.

I'm seeing an increase of misinformation on social media, and it just continues to grow and grow. There's no longer that debate about different opinions or perspectives; it's more about debating the facts of reality, which I find really scary and concerning. We know there are reporting structures on social media sites. Twitter and Facebook, of course, are at the front line of complaints around this right now.

Can companies that profit from engagement effectively stop the spread of disinformation? How do we make sure, in this country, that misinformation isn't being impacted by foreign interference, especially in terms of our elections?

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: Maybe I could start and then pass it to Michelle.

It's an excellent question. We have discussed that with members of the social media companies. There are many of them with whom we have very robust relationships. It's in their business interest as well for their platforms not to be used for nefarious purposes. For the most part, we have found excellent collaboration among our industry partners.

There are certainly other online platforms that are maybe hosted in other countries, and we don't have a relationship with those. Those are the ones, at least from a foreign perspective insofar as they are in other countries, that we are actively looking at to determine whether foreign governments are using them in order to disseminate such information to Canada. We then advise government about those threats so that we can determine, particularly in a case of election interference, which organization might be best placed to address that.

Also, at CSE, we are able to use active cyber-operations. If ever we were to find reasonable grounds to believe that a foreign government was using platforms to target Canadians, there would be ways we could disrupt those activities. I don't know if Michelle...?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: You answered it well, Alia. It is certainly a key topic during SITE discussions, that type of activity we see during an electoral period, and as Alia pointed out, who is best placed to address it to the best of our ability.

The Chair: Thank you so much.

We'll just do a quick one of up to two minutes for Mr. Cooper, followed by Ms. Sahota.

Go ahead, Mr. Cooper.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

In the CSIS report entitled, “Foreign Interference Threats to Canada's Democratic Process”, it's noted that some donors to political candidates may have connections to foreign states and may be coerced into making donations. It says, “Political parties and candidates may also receive funds...seemingly from a Canadian, though this may have originated from a foreign threat actor”, and, “Threat actors can use someone as a proxy to conduct illicit financing activities on their behalf.”

Can you elaborate on this? This is quite alarming. Do you have a sense of how much foreign money is being funnelled in this way?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Obviously I can't go into specifics about some of our investigations, but we know that this is of concern and that it is a possibility. We put it in our public report to bring awareness to this potential threat and to how some hostile state actors are seeking to use funding. I can't go into the details of what we have done operationally, but I can say that it was of significant enough concern for us to put it in our public report to raise awareness.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Do you have any recommendations on how to combat this threat?

Ms. Michelle Tessier: Certainly we would look at all the tools at our investigative disposal in terms of knowing, if we come across this type of activity, how we would address it, working with other stakeholders, creating awareness and raising it, perhaps, directly with an individual who may be unwitting to this type of information or this source of funding.

It really is looking at all the tools at our disposal to ensure that people are aware this is occurring, and working, as an example, with the Office of the Commissioner of Elections, should this meet its mandate as well.

The Chair: Thank you.

Ms. Sahota, you have two minutes.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: Thank you, Madam Chair. My question is for Ms. Tayyeb.

Would you agree that many of Canada's policing agencies and intelligence agencies have traditionally had a blind spot for right- wing extremism? That has now been revealed through what has occurred on Capitol Hill and even with the commission we're seeing for the convoy, whether they are foreign actors or sometimes a mix of foreign and domestic, which becomes quite confusing. I know some of the threats in Canada's terrorism reports have been revised over the years to include some of these threats more recently, but traditionally they weren't necessarily investigated to the extent that we are trying to catch up to today.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: I can speak on behalf of CSE. Certainly, any ideologically motivated violent extremism that originates from foreign sources and is directed towards Canada would be something we would look at. We have been active in that space for a very long time.

With respect to the first part of your question, I wouldn't be in a position to comment on police forces or security agencies. I know we all take threats to Canadians very seriously. That's been my experience in the community.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: In terms of what distinguishes foreign interference from legitimate international diplomacy, could you maybe distinguish the characteristics of the two? From some of the stuff we've heard today, perhaps there's a lot of overlap that sometimes is used domestically here on the ground by different countries.

Ms. Alia Tayyeb: Indeed, I can start off with that, and I'll pass it over to Michelle as well. From our perspective, there are many legitimate diplomatic activities that are undertaken by nation states with respect to Canada. When we qualify it as interference or influence is when that activity is covert and deceptive in nature. The activities trying to be undertaken are to influence Canadian decision- makers in a way that is contrary to Canadian national interests, and—

The Chair: Thank you.

I appreciate the information. Because I've had to interrupt so many times, if you can take the time to provide us some of the information that was requested via the clerk, I believe members would really benefit from it for the purpose of this study.

I also want to appreciate the way both of you have worked together in providing answers. I think it's the first visual I've had as to how well our partners can work together.

I want to thank both of you for taking the time to be with us today. I look forward to seeing more from you, through the clerk, that will be shared with all members. With that, I wish the two of you a good day.

For PROC committee members, today the recommendations for the precinct study are due by five o'clock to the clerk. Thursday we will resume with witnesses on this study. On Friday by noon, we are asking for hybrid study recommendations to the clerk in both official languages.

Then we will be headed into a constituency week. I think there is some desire to see a subcommittee meet for the first time, which is probably what we'll try to do on the Thursday when we return from the constituency week. Then we'll make our plan accordingly.

Go ahead, Ms. Blaney.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Is it Thursday or Tuesday when we return?

The Chair: It's Tuesday, November 14. I'm sorry. I get so excited

Through the constituency week, please stay tuned, as reports will be coming to you. We will make sure teams have about a week with the report prior to our getting it to drafting at this committee, so everyone has time to read it. There's lots of information.

Happy Tuesday. Have a good day. This meeting is adjourned.

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Transcript of Study Meeting #2 (November 3, 2022)

44th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

EVIDENCE

NUMBER 038

Thursday, November 3, 2022

Chair: The Honourable Bardish Chagger

[Translation]

The Chair (Hon. Bardish Chagger (Waterloo, Lib.)): I call the meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 38 of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

The committee is meeting today to continue its study on foreign election interference.

[English]

Our first panel consists of the security and intelligence threats to elections task force. For the second panel, we have two experts who have spent much time examining the vulnerabilities of the electoral system to foreign election interference and misinformation or disinformation.

I would like to let the committee know that all virtual witnesses have undergone the pre-committee connectivity and audio tests.

With regard to interpretation for those on Zoom, you have the choice, at the bottom of your screen, of floor, English or French. Those in the room can use the earpiece and select the desired channel. Before we start, I will remind you that all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair.

For our first panel, we have Tara Denham, director general, office of human rights, freedoms and inclusion, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development; Lisa Ducharme, acting director general, federal policing national intelligence, Royal Canadian Mounted Police; and Adam Fisher, director general, intelligence assessments, Canadian Security Intelligence Service. We will also be hearing from Mr. Lyall King, director, risk mitigation programs, Communications Security Establishment.

Mr. King, I know you have four minutes, but because you are the only person speaking, I will provide leniency. You can have up to five minutes.

Welcome to PROC.

Mr. Lyall King (Director, Risk Mitigation Programs, Communications Security Establishment, Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force): Thank you. That's very kind, Madam Chair. I appreciate that.

Hello. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee, for the invitation to appear today. My name is Lyall King, and I'm the former chair of the security and intelligence threats to elections task force—SITE for short. I am now the director of risk mitigation programs at the Communications Security Establishment. I am pleased to be joined by my colleagues from each of the organizations that make up the SITE task force.

I know that earlier this week you heard from the CSE and CSIS. While that brief focused on threats of foreign interference as a whole, I will focus on providing an overview from the SITE perspective.

The SITE task force comprises officials from the Communications Security Establishment, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Global Affairs Canada and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Together, we have a mandate to provide a clear point of engagement within the security and intelligence community for government partners; to review and focus intelligence collection, assessment and open-source analysis related to foreign interference; to provide government partners, senior public servants and other partners with situational awareness; and to promote the use of intelligence, assessment and open-source information analysis in the protection of electoral processes through sharing with partners or, when mandates permit, taking action to mitigate the threat.

Each organization here today has a distinct mandate that allows us to work together to reduce the threat of foreign interference against our democratic institutions in Canada.

I would like to take a moment to highlight some of the important contributions that our partners have made to the SITE task force. This is an overview and does not cover all of the roles and responsibilities of SITE members.

CSIS provides threat briefings and intelligence reporting to Elections Canada and the Commissioner of Canada Elections and provides assessments of hostile state activity methodologies and capabilities to Government of Canada decision-makers.

Global Affairs Canada provides research on disinformation campaigns targeting Canada by foreign actors and reports on global trends, metrics, and incidents.

The RCMP investigates criminal activity related to interference or influence of Canada's electoral processes and works closely in partnership with intelligence, law enforcement and regulatory agencies.

CSE provides intelligence and cyber-assessments on the intentions, activities and capabilities of foreign threat actors, protects government systems and networks related to elections through cyber-defence measures, and provides cybersecurity advice and guidance to political parties, provinces and other institutions involved in democratic processes.

It is important to note that, in addition to SITE, there was a panel of non-partisan senior civil servants who administered the critical election incident public protocol. SITE provided regular intelligence updates to the panel and also gave classified briefings to Canada's main political parties to ensure that they were aware of the threats.

The important work of the SITE task force progresses outside of election periods as we continue to help the government assess and respond to foreign threats to Canada's electoral processes.

Members, I hope this has helped paint a better picture of the SITE task force and the important role that each of our organizations plays in safeguarding Canadian democracy.

I do thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today, and we look forward to answering any of the questions that you may have.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you for that excellent introduction.

We will start with six-minute rounds, commencing with Mr. Cooper, followed by Mrs. Romanado, then Madame Gaudreau and then Mr. MacGregor.

Mr. Cooper, go ahead.

Mr. Michael Cooper (St. Albert—Edmonton, CPC): Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses.

I will direct my questions to whichever witness is able to answer them.

I want to talk about the 2021 federal election campaign. It has now been established that there was interference by Chinese Communist-controlled media. There was a proliferation of disinformation on social media platforms that was influenced or controlled by the Chinese Communist regime. There were civil society organizations that had reported on such interference during the election campaign, including DisinfoWatch.

During the election campaign, the rapid response mechanism at Global Affairs had observed such interference in terms of the spreading of disinformation, specifically targeting the Conservative Party and individual Conservative candidates. One glaring example was in the case of Kenny Chiu, the incumbent Conservative member in the riding of Steveston—Richmond East. It had been mentioned that there is in place the critical election incident public protocol, the purpose of which is to communicate transparently with Canadians during an election about incidents that threaten the integrity of the election. Pursuant to the protocol, barring any overriding national security or public security reasons, the agencies will inform affected parties of any information regarding interference.

Was Kenny Chiu informed?

Mr. Lyall King: Madam Chair, I can begin with a comment and then perhaps open it up to my colleagues.

Thank you very much for the question. I appreciate it.

I would just note that there were activities observed, certainly during the election. I will note in context, as well, that it's activity that we also see on a persistent basis; that is to say, we observe things before, during and after an election. That's what SITE is also looking at, the task force, looking at those behaviours over a period of time.

I will say—

Mr. Michael Cooper: My time is limited. My question is specifically about the 2021 election.

I know there were things that were happening before and there are things happening now, but this protocol is in place during the election campaign. The panel is in place during the election campaign. Pursuant to the protocol, if there's evidence of interference, the affected party will be informed.

My question is very simple. Was Kenny Chiu informed?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you. I appreciate that clarification on the timing.

I will very simply say that we had advised the critical election incident protocol panel of the information. In terms of making public statements, it is their decision whether or not it meets a threshold to do so. We at SITE simply present the information.

I will open it up—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Barring any overriding national or public security reasons, pursuant to protocol, the affected party will be informed. Was he informed or wasn't he?

Mr. Lyall King: My apologies, sir. I will ask my colleague Adam Fisher from the service if he may be able to respond to that particular question.

Mr. Adam Fisher (Director General, Intelligence Assessments, Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force): Thank you very much.

Good morning, Madam Chair. Through you, thank you for the question. On that issue, we clearly can't speak to specifics of cases or investigations. What we can say—I'm echoing what my colleague has said—is that throughout the election, any incidents or intelligence that pointed to foreign influence activity from a foreign state would have been provided in a coherent manner to the panel of five. From there, it was for them to determine whether it reached their threshold and required onward action.

I can assure you that certainly we were alive to threats throughout the election period and leading up to it and providing intelligence and advice, along with our colleagues.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Pursuant to the protocol, if a certain threshold is met, the public is to be informed.

The public wasn't informed. Why not?

Mr. Lyall King: I will attempt to answer that. Thank you for your question.

I will simply note that this is a decision that is in the sole purview of the panel of five, as we would refer to them, the panel of five senior civil servants. The SITE task force does not have insight as to how and when they make those decisions. We stand here and we deliver the information so that they are able to make an informed decision.

We, as SITE, would not be able to answer the question of why something had or had not met the threshold. That is up to the purview of the panel, sir.

The Chair: Thank you.

Ms. Denham, did you want to say something?

Ms. Tara Denham (Director General, Office of Human Rights, Freedoms and Inclusion, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development, Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force): Thank you, Chair.

I just wanted to add to it, because the reference was to some of the reporting of the rapid response mechanism.

Just to echo answers of other colleagues, we did see some of the activity, but in the reporting of the rapid response mechanism— again, we're looking for foreign threats—we were not able to verify whether the behaviour was directed by state, whether it was organic or whether it was an intermingling of the two.

I just want to clarify that.

The Chair: Thank you.

I will just remind all colleagues that if we're going to interrupt, it's best that we go through the chair. For the purposes of our interpreters and the work that we do, it's important that we provide time to our guests, who have accepted our invitation to be here with the information we are looking for.

With that, Mrs. Romanado, you have six minutes.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado (Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, Lib.): Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

First of all, I want to thank the witnesses for being here today. I also want to inquire a little bit more about something that was mentioned in the opening remarks. Mr. King, you mentioned the classified briefings to political parties, and we were just hearing a little bit about that. Could you elaborate a little bit on what you would classify as a political party?

As you can imagine, Canada can have hundreds of different political parties that are registered with Elections Canada. Some of them may not be as well established or as well known. Do you provide these classified briefings to all political parties that are registered, or is there a certain threshold or criteria that are required?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you very much for your question.

I would first say that it was the role of the Privy Council Office, our colleagues in the security and intelligence and the director there who brokered these engagements. It's not SITE directly; it's through the Privy Council Office.

They would send invites out to, I believe, registered political parties. From my recollection, an invite would have been sent out explaining what the intent and purpose was, and then there would be a follow-up for those who were willing to engage. It was really on the invitees to accept or decline.

The Privy Council Office is the body that would have done that. Thank you.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado: Okay, thank you.

You mentioned classified briefings. I know that, for instance, when a minister or a parliamentary secretary is sworn in, we go through additional security background checks and so on in order to receive security clearance status of secret or further up in terms of top secret, and so on.

When you mentioned classified briefings to political parties, volunteers and employees of political parties do not necessarily have classified security clearance. Could you elaborate a bit on what you referred to when you said “classified briefings”?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you, again, for the question.

The classified briefings were typically at secret level. It was, to be fair, a fairly small grouping. We would naturally look at, perhaps, campaign managers or chief information officers of the parties to target them in terms of the information briefings. We'd provide some general overviews of the nature of the threat to understand the threat landscape and what we were dealing with on a regular basis. We'd provide some context for what they may see and, at the end of the day, just open a dialogue to be able to have some open discussions with partners in that space should something arise.

They were classified briefings with a fairly small community at the secret level.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado: Thank you.

Switching gears a bit, I wanted to get your thoughts—it could be from anyone on the panel today—on the benefits of a registry of foreign agents. What are your thoughts on that?

Mr. Lyall King: I will open it up to see if any of my colleagues want to have a say first.

Mr. Adam Fisher: Through you, Madam Chair, thank you for the question. I can take a run at that.

I'm not a policy person. I'm not from a policy department. We provide intelligence and advice to government, so I hope you'll forgive me for answering the question in a general way.

What I would say is that the threat of foreign influence activity is something that is felt not only here in Canada. It's felt by our closest allies, our Five Eyes allies. We're all dealing with the same threat and from, in large part, the same aggressive adversaries. There's a lot to learn from each other. There's a lot to learn from our partners, as they are learning from us. My understanding is, for example, that the SITE task force is unique to Canada and is something our allies have looked to emulate in their jurisdictions.

Yes, I'm not answering your question directly, but I would say there's a lot to learn, and I know that certainly in intelligence circles we speak on a constant basis with our allies, and in policy circles, as well, the same is being done. Ultimately, of course, it's up to the government to decide what sort of policy fixes they'd like to see in place to address the issue.

Thank you.

Mrs. Sherry Romanado: Mr. King, do you want to chime in on that one?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you.

I don't really have much more to add, other than to say that there are obviously a number of tools that can assist us in attempting to identify aspects of foreign interference. While I wouldn't want to comment specifically on a foreign registry, I would just say that could be another of those tools that could be implemented, among the others. As Mr. Fisher has highlighted, we look to understand and share with allies...their best practices also, what they have in play and how that may or may not assist us in our efforts to combat foreign interference.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Go ahead, Ms. Gaudreau. You have six minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau (Laurentides—Labelle, BQ):

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm from a wonderful little area not far from here, Laurentides— Labelle.

As I listen to everything that's being said, I'm thinking about my constituents, the people following our proceedings and voters in general, and wondering what information they need to know.

It's not at all reassuring to hear, right off the bat, that foreign actors are targeting a specific party in an effort to interfere in elections. I want to use my time to learn more from the witnesses.

I understand what the role of the Privy Council Office is, but I want to know what the limits are regarding information that is not to be shared, once the threshold has been reached. I'd also like to know why we are learning about this now and why it takes a committee to have this discussion.

Perhaps those concerned are aware of what's going on, but how is it that voters know so little about the problem of foreign interference?

I'd like a short answer, Madam Chair. [English]

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you very much for the question, Madam

Chair. Maybe I will have a go at answering this.

I think it's a fantastic question. It's one that we've talked about a fair bit as a SITE group in terms of wanting to make sure that information is relevant and available to the public as well, so I would say that when it comes to constituents, it's about education and information sharing at the end of the day. That's what it comes down to.

In terms of educating, certainly the Government of Canada— CSE—has produced a number of reports over the years on threats to democratic processes, in 2017, 2019 and 2021, updating the types of things that people can look out for and how they can protect themselves. There's plenty of advice and guidance online as well, which we have on our website.

We've also issued, as I'm sure you've heard this week, the national cyber-threat assessment, which does talk a bit more generically about what people may expect to see and what the real risks are to Canadians with respect to cyber-threats. Cybercrime is one of those.

Equally, we mentioned the activities of nation-states in those products as well, in terms of Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. As well, I know the service has issued a number of products publicly to describe the ways in which foreign-fed actors behave and the methodologies they use. So “education, education, education” is one thing I would say.

The other thing is letting people understand what is a good source. Evaluate your sources, and that's I think probably a challenge there. It's not just the SITE task force and our intelligence agencies playing a role here, but equally, certainly, Elections Canada as well, in terms of providing clear, valid, good information for the public.

I'll stop there and open it up to my colleagues if they have additional comments.

Mr. Adam Fisher: Madam Chair, if I can have a couple of seconds, I can add to that and reinforce the message from my colleague.

From a service perspective, we see this as critically important. Foreign-influenced activity cannot be addressed by the federal government alone, never mind other levels of government and civil society. Although our founding act and our mandate have always been to provide highly classified information to government, we have, in the last five to 10 years, developed a very robust stakeholder engagement program through which we engage with civil society, academics, communities, diaspora communities, the media, industry and all levels of government. We do that in an unclassified setting. There's a lot we can talk about in an unclassified setting that prepares Canadians well to be able to identify the threats that we face in an FI environment.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you.

I have a very important question. Are we adequately equipped?

When I think about two-factor authentication and the biometric information financial institutions have been requiring of their clients for quite some time now, I wonder whether we have the tools we need to respond to cyber-attacks against individuals.

You monitor the situation beyond the scope of elections. Do you think we are way off track when it comes to our legislation? You mentioned our Five Eyes partners. Are there comparisons to be drawn in terms of what's being done elsewhere? Are there best practices we should be following?

[English]

Mr. Lyall King: Madam Chair, I will attempt to answer a bit of that question.

I would say that we are in an environment that is increasingly online. We talked about this, and I'll refer back to the national cyber- threat assessment for this piece. Canada has a pretty significant digital economy. We understand people are working in hybrid ways now. We have to use the Internet, so it comes down—

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: In light of your expertise, do you think we are adequately equipped?

If not, efforts are needed on a number of fronts: privacy protection, education and digital media transparency. That's a lot. You shouldn't be working in the wilderness.

Are we well equipped? [English]

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you for the clarification.

My response is that it's an ever-changing environment. We always have to be evolving ourselves and our methodologies to address the threats. Can we ever be 100% sure that we are able to deal with everything? I think the answer is no.

I think the point here is pushing the bar and the message around resilience. It's not necessarily whether something will happen, but being prepared for when it happens, and that means being able to detect—

The Chair: Thank you.

We're going to go to Mr. MacGregor for six minutes.

Mr. Alistair MacGregor (Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, NDP): Thank you, Madam Chair. I really appreciate hearing from our witnesses today. The committee that I'm usually a member of is the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security. The witnesses' organizations are no strangers to appearing before that committee.

I'm glad to see the procedure and House affairs committee looking at this issue, because at the public safety committee, we have looked at issues of ideologically motivated violent extremism and Canada's security stance vis-à-vis Russia. We have had a number of experts in the field and representing your agencies—including the chief of the defence staff—who have painted a very stark picture about the changing geopolitical tensions in the international order, particularly the threats posed to Canada and other like-minded democracies by Russia and China. I think the testimony from General Wayne Eyre was a wake-up call for every member of that committee. We have heard a lot of information in the course of both of our studies about what foreign actors are attempting to do to disrupt the Canadian democratic system and influence our citizens and our democratic norms.

What I would like to hear a bit more from you about is. One of

the areas that we have concentrated on is the role of social media platforms. We've really grappled with what the correct course of action is for Canada's Parliament to take in terms of how we regulate them and what kinds of partnerships we need to establish with them.

Could one of you inform us as to what your working relationship is like with some of the major social media platforms? Are there ways that parliamentarians could help you improve that relationship?

Take a few minutes to talk about that, please.

Ms. Tara Denham: Madam Chair, I could perhaps start on that one. Thank you for the question.

Again, I'm going to start with the context of the elections. As this committee is familiar with, there was the Declaration on Electoral Integrity Online. That's a voluntary declaration that social media companies were encouraged to participate in. A number of them have signed on, which is progress. I think we need to continue to work on those types of declarations and encourage more social media companies to sign on.

From a Global Affairs perspective, we're looking at that and sharing what we've done, so a best practice is that declaration. We then look at what other countries are doing and the result of that. That type of work, like the declaration, also encourages social media companies to work together; they're collaborating to understand what the space is and what actions are taken. We then look at that and say, if the collective of this is happening not only in Canada but in other countries, then how do we engage in a global conversation, perhaps about frameworks of behaviour for social media companies? I know there are a lot of conversations about legislation. National legislation would not be the purview of Global Affairs. I can say that we're watching that and we engage in entities like the Freedom Online Coalition, of which Canada is currently the chair. We try to push those conversations about what can be done when you're talking about actions that cross national and international borders.

Mr. Alistair MacGregor: Thank you for that answer.

Mr. King, you mentioned that it's an ever-changing threat environment, and I think the subtext is that we have to be nimble. In your opinion, what are the legislative, policy and funding gaps to which parliamentarians should pay particular attention to enable your collection of agencies to meet this ever-changing threat environment? What should parliamentarians, maybe those on the public safety committee and this committee, be paying attention to, so that you have the tools required to do your jobs and protect our democratic system?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you for the question.

To be quite frank, I don't think I would be qualified to necessarily comment on some of those big things you've asked for, sir.

I think I would underline—keeping it in a SITE perspective and the particular roles and mandates of our organization as part of SITE—that we need to continue to make sure we have an open dialogue with social media companies. We each have different areas of focus and different ways to engage. From a cyber centre perspective, that means working with them to try to highlight threats that we see through our aperture, what we understand that to be, and to learn from them as to how we can detect, respond to and reduce those threats.

I would not want to comment on the legislative aspect of things. I would maybe double down, from a SITE perspective, that we want to continue to engage and have an open and collaborative, sharing relationship where that's possible.

Adam, I'm not sure whether you would like to comment from the services perspective.

Mr. Adam Fisher: No, I think you covered it nicely.

I could make a pitch, and I hope my colleagues will forgive me for doing this. I'm on solid ground in doing it. I know my deputy director has said the same thing in front of this committee.

In terms of social media and the technology of foreign-influenced activity, the threat is evolving. Certainly, speaking from a service point of view, we don't have all the tools to adequately understand that threat. What I'm referring to in particular is the ability to look at data and integrate that into our investigations and assessments. Our act has not kept pace in terms of the technology and the legal landscape in that respect.

That's something that certainly my organization would flag as perhaps needing something there.

The Chair: Thank you.

We will now go for five minutes to Mr. Calkins, followed by Monsieur Fergus.

Mr. Blaine Calkins (Red Deer—Lacombe, CPC): Thank you. I'll keep going on that vein of questioning.

Mr. Fisher, is it because the legislation is not technologically neutral enough, or is there some other gap? Can you be a little more specific, without giving away our monitoring posture or anything like that? Your answer was interesting, but vague enough that I might not have got it.

Mr. Adam Fisher: It was probably by design, Madam Chair. Forgive me for being so general about it. It's really not my area of expertise.

I'll say that our act was designed in 1984, and it has not had significant changes or amendments. Certainly the technological environment we find ourselves in now, combined with the very real necessity to guard privacy rights and constitutional rights that are top of mind here, requires a rethink of how we approach these threats.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Madam Chair, in 1984 I was singing along to Van Halen on the radio, and I can assure you that is a very long time ago. If we were lucky, we had a Sony Walkman.

This is a little bit alarming, so I'm hoping there is a way that you and your organization can be a little more direct, maybe through another medium, with members of this committee, but your point is well taken.

I have a general question for you. It's one thing to identify the threat. It's one thing to monitor it, and it's one thing to track it, given the current structure of the legislation. It's another thing to inform the panel of five that you talked about, and it's another thing for them to decide that a threshold is met and to inform electors or to talk to political parties.

I want to talk a bit more about what we are doing to interdict, disrupt and, if necessary, carry out an investigation and prosecution of a foreign actor that might be operating within the territorial confines of Canada. Is there anybody here who can speak to whether or not we have any gaps on that front?

Mr. Adam Fisher: Madam Chair, I can perhaps start, and then I'll hand it over to my colleague from the RCMP.

Certainly in terms of action that the service can take when it sees foreign-influenced activity occurring within Canada, we have mechanisms under our threat reduction mandate, both warranted and non-warranted solutions, that are sometimes applied to foreign- influenced activity that we see in an attempt to diminish that threat. We usually approach this in a very collaborative way with other government agencies and departments so that we choose the best tool.

When it comes to prosecution, that does become difficult in this space. It's the age-old problem of transferring intelligence into an evidentiary arena, and that is difficult. There are ways to do it, and it's always an option on the table.

I'll stop there and maybe let my colleague from the Mounties jump in.

Ms. Lisa Ducharme (Acting Director General, Federal Policing National Intelligence, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force): Thank you for the question.

With respect to foreign interference threats in general, the RCMP uses all of its authorities to be able to tackle these problems and looks for the criminality per the Security of Information Act. It must be able to prove that there is espionage, release of classified information, foreign influence, threats or violence. It also has the Criminal Code, which has various offences such as threat, intimidation and bribery of officials, and it also has other legislative tools at its disposal.

When it comes to election issues, it is the Commissioner of Canada Elections who is responsible for determining whether they wish to proceed with an investigation, and that is with the advice of Elections Canada and the panel of five, and through the SITE task force advising the panel of five.

The RCMP has a memorandum of understanding with the Commissioner of Canada Elections to investigate what they want to pursue. We can work with them on joint investigations, and we can provide technical assistance, advice, guidance and other such support, should they wish to proceed with an investigation.

Thank you.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: My colleague adjacent to me just said that elections are a very short window, and this process sounds like it is a very long process.

Madam Chair, I'll take the time from my colleague in the next round, if it's possible.

If you could boil down any efficiencies that this committee should be aware of, anything that can make that process more efficient for your organizations, and let this committee know, I think this committee would appreciate it.

The Chair: Thank you.

Vice-Chair Nater was kind enough to offer time for an answer right now, but we can take that in writing, per Mr. Calkins' preference.

[Translation]

Now it's over to Mr. Fergus for five minutes.

Hon. Greg Fergus (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for sharing their insights today. This is a very serious issue.

I have three questions, and I'll start with the easiest one.

Mr. King, in response to a fellow member's question, you said that China, North Korea, Iran and Russia were the top four countries responsible for political interference on social media.

I know most of our questions have focused on China, but can you tell us briefly what the other countries are doing? Is it the same thing that China is doing, or is it different? Is there a difference quality-wise in their unwanted interference?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you for your question.

I'm going to switch to English, so I can provide a clearer answer. [English]

Thank you very much.

I should clarify something there. When I listed the countries that I did, they're from the national cyber-threat assessment, which speaks to the strategic cyber-threats to Canada from nation-states, rather than specifically those countries being engaged in social media-related activities targeting us in a political sense during that. I should really just clarify that.

I will note that, generally speaking, when it comes to threats to democratic processes—and it's no surprise, as we've mentioned this before—China and Russia tend to be the two big players in that space. They do represent different threats to us because they behave in different ways, because of their different interests, intent and capabilities.

I would just like to be very clear that the comment on those four countries that I noted was in relation to the broader strategic threat to Canada from a cyber perspective, sir. Thank you.

[Translation]

Hon. Greg Fergus: Thanks for clarifying that.

Can you tell us the difference between what China is doing and what Russia is doing? We've talked a lot about China, but I'd like to hear about Russia as well.

What kinds of activities is Russia engaged in, and how are they different from China's?

[English]

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you.

I'll make a brief comment and perhaps open it up to my colleague from the service as well.

Again, I have to underline that I obviously can't get into the specifics of some of the things that we understand of the behaviours and activities of these states, but it's easy enough to point out, I think, from open-source intelligence and what you see in the press, to be quite frank, as to how things unfold. You'll even see social media companies, for example, outing the use of fake accounts and that sort of thing.

Russia and China do have different ways of operating in that sphere, but I couldn't comment specifically on some of the things that we observe. I will maybe just open this up to Mr. Fisher from the service to see if he wants to add any nuance to that.

Mr. Adam Fisher: Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'll speak in general terms again, not specific to social media, and I'll just make a couple of comments. My colleague has already referred to this. Their approaches and their activity in the FI space do depend on their strategic intent. From open sources, you can generally infer that Russia is more inclined towards disrupting and undermining our system of government through messaging that casts what is happening here in some doubt. China, I would say, by comparison, is more interested in working within the system to corrupt it, compromising officials, elected officials and individuals at all levels of government, within industry, within civil society, using our open and free society for their nefarious purposes.

That's how I would, at a very high level, generally distinguish between the two. I would say that, without a doubt, China is the foremost aggressor in this space.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Go ahead, Ms. Gaudreau. You have two and a half minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I will be asking our valued witnesses questions that they will have to answer in writing for the purposes of our report. We'll let you know when we need those answers by at the end of the meeting.

I'm going to fire off all my questions.

You said that you looked to what the Five Eyes partners were doing, so I'd like to know what best practices the Five Eyes have adopted.

You also talked about the tools you use to carry out your work. We don't have time to get into them now, but I'd like to know more about those tools.

I asked you earlier whether you were adequately equipped to do your work. You mentioned a few things, but I'd like you to provide a more thorough answer.

Lastly, two things I took away from your comments were transparency and education. What do you need on that front?

You can take the last little bit of time to tell me what you need in order to ensure people are educated about this. As pointed out, we should be embarrassed about the state of privacy protection. The legislation goes back to 1984. I hope that will get through to people.

You have about 30 seconds to comment.

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you for your questions. Once again, I'm going to answer in English.

[English]

That's a lot of questions.

I would just maybe underline, in terms of the authorities and tools we have to do our jobs, that, as Mr. Fisher has already stated, the service might require some updates to legislation, given the age of that. CSE did have the Communications Security Establishment Act come into force in 2019, which has enabled and provided us with additional tools, which we are using. Therefore, from a CSE perspective, we feel that this modernization has really helped us quite significantly, and it just remains to continually invest in our ability to stay on top of the issue from a technological perspective with investment.

Perhaps Tara or Lisa would like to speak.

The Chair: Not this time, but I look forward to hearing from you next time.

Mr. MacGregor, you have two and a half minutes.

Mr. Alistair MacGregor: Thank you, Madam Chair.

To our witnesses, I want to focus specifically on Russia, because of the conflict in Ukraine and the changed relationship between Canada and Russia because of that conflict.

At our public safety committee, we have heard testimony during the studies that I previously mentioned about the relationship between the Russian government and various Russian criminal organizations that commit a variety of financial crimes around the world. There's also a sort of loose relationship between the Russian government and these criminal organizations within Russia.

My two questions are as follows. Can you comment about this relationship vis-à-vis foreign influence? Second, how has activity from Russia changed from the beginning of the conflict in Ukraine? What kind of trends can you broadly speak about that you have observed since the start of that conflict?

Mr. Lyall King: Adam, do you want to have a crack at that first?

Mr. Adam Fisher: Sure. We're veering a little bit outside the scope of election security.

Certainly, with the conflict in Ukraine, we've seen Russia using social media to promote its narrative of blaming the invasion on the aggression of NATO. That narrative is obviously counter to the one the west subscribes to. What the conflict has changed has been maybe their focus in terms of the narratives they're pushing, through both overt and covert means.

Mr. Alistair MacGregor: To be clear, I was asking whether their activity has changed vis-à-vis interference in elections, not only in Canada but also among our democratic allies, just to be specific.

Mr. Adam Fisher: I'm not sure I have an adequate answer for you on that one in an unclassified forum.

Mr. Lyall King: Perhaps I can just offer that it's a space we continue to look at to try to understand. Again, it may veer a little bit outside of what the SITE focus is, but in terms of understanding the nexus between the various components of the Russian regime—

The Chair: Thank you.

We will now go to Mr. Nater for two minutes—maybe even two and a half—followed by Ms. O'Connell.

Mr. Nater, go ahead.

Mr. John Nater (Perth—Wellington, CPC): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses.

I want to start with a question and open it up to whoever is best positioned to answer it.

When we see some diaspora approaching a million to 1.5 million individuals within Canada, and the fact that often an election can be decided by a handful of seats—a dozen or so seats, with a total of 20,000 to 30,000 votes total, can influence an election—how capable are foreign state actors currently of moving that needle by 20,000 to 30,000 votes among the diaspora within Canada?

Mr. Lyall King: I'm sorry, Adam, but I may pick on you for that one.

Mr. Adam Fisher: Madam Chair, thank you.

I'm hesitant to comment precisely on the extent to which foreign adversaries can turn the needle in certain ridings or elections.

Certainly with respect to China, they look to interfere domestically in all respects. That includes in certain elections and ridings. They certainly see local diaspora as an opportunity to advance their narrative and to coerce and pursue outcomes that are in the interests of the PRC. The intent is there, and certainly I'm speaking in very

general terms here. I'm not speaking specifically of the last election or any particular riding. In general terms, certainly they see that as an opportunity for foreign influence activity.

Mr. John Nater: Thank you for that. I want to go briefly to Mr. King.

Earlier this week, the Chief Electoral Officer stated that Elections Canada did not experience any breaches to its IT infrastructure or interference with its electoral operations, which I think is good. My question for you is whether you would agree with that.

Second, very briefly—and perhaps you can answer in writing at a future date—what threats do you see in terms of the IT infrastructure for Elections Canada when considering 338 electoral districts and 338 riding offices?

The Chair: I'll give 30 seconds for an answer.

Mr. John Nater: Thank you.

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you very much for the question.

Madam Chair, in response, I would certainly say that I absolutely agree with the Chief Electoral Officer in terms of that assessment. The cyber centre has worked very closely with Elections Canada for many years, in terms of hardening systems and being able to detect and defend in that space. We're quite confident on that particular view.

The other thing, in terms of looking at the overall threat—

The Chair: I'm going to have to let it go there. I'm sorry. I was trying.

We will make sure that we.......... I will reiterate a couple of points at the end.

Ms. O'Connell, you have three minutes.

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell (Pickering—Uxbridge, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

On Tuesday, we heard from CSIS that foreign actors, whether it's to disrupt or influence elections, are not strictly supporting one party over the other, but are really about showing distrust in political institutions and in democracy. That vein is the context for my questions.

The 2020 CSIS annual report also talks about foreign governments continuing to try to interfere in Canadian affairs—in this context, elections. That same 2020 CSIS report speaks a lot about incels, and in particular people who go to forums to promote violence against women.

In the context of foreign state actors trying to promote violence, disinformation and misinformation, would you suggest that incels—which CSIS has identified in terms of violent extremism— are a forum where foreign state actors might want to create upheaval in our democratic institutions? In particular, would the promotion of violence against women be a forum where foreign state actors might love to delve in and promote disinformation and misinformation?

Mr. Lyall King: Thank you for the question, Madam Chair.

Again, I'll answer that in a general way. What I would say is that our adversaries are opportunistic. They look for issues that are divisive domestically and they exploit them. Certainly that is a theoretical possibility, and foreign adversaries could take advantage of that domestically.

I would also clarify or expand a bit on the reference to foreigninfluenced activity disrupting Canadian society and undermining our institutions. Equally, in foreign-influenced activity, there are states that are looking to exploit the system we have from the inside in a covert and deceptive way. That is equally worrisome and of concern for the service from a national security perspective.

[Translation]

The Chair: Thank you to the witnesses for your participation.

As the members have requested, we would appreciate it if you would send the clerk the necessary information, whether classified as secret or not.

We also appreciate the time you've taken to participate in our study. We thank you for the work you do and the responsibilities you shoulder.

Have a good day. [English]

I will suspend really quickly and we'll get ready with panel two. Please stay close to your seats, because I'd like to start it within two minutes.

Thank you.

(Pause)

[Translation]

The Chair: Now that the second panel is ready, we will resume the meeting.

We have two witnesses joining us.

We are welcoming Marcus Kolga, director of DisinfoWatch, and Jim Judd, former director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, who is appearing as an individual.

We'll start with Mr. Kolga.

Welcome, Mr. Kolga. You have four minutes for your opening statement.

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga (Director, DisinfoWatch): Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee, for dedicating your time to study the threat posed by disinformation to election integrity and, indeed, the cohesion of our entire democracy.

My name is Marcus Kolga. I've been monitoring, analyzing and exposing Russian disinformation for the past 15 years. In 2020, I started DisinfoWatch, a platform dedicated to exposing foreign disinformation narratives with the support of the U.S. State Department and Journalists for Human Rights, under the roof of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. DisinfoWatch was initially focused on tracking foreign disinformation about COVID-19. We expanded its scope in 2021, and we were actively tracking foreign narratives during the last federal election.

In the weeks before the September 20, 2021, election, we were alerted to Chinese state media narratives that directly targeted the Conservative Party and its leader, Erin O’Toole. Simultaneously, members of the Chinese Canadian community brought to our attention similar narratives appearing on local Canadian Chinese-language media platforms and the Chinese social media channel WeChat. WeChat is commonly regarded as a tool used by the Chinese government for surveillance and repression.

On September 9, 2021, the Chinese Communist Party-owned tabloid Global Times published an article attacking the Conservative Party’s foreign policy platform. The Global Times article threatened Canadians that if they elected a Conservative government, Canadians should expect “strong counter strike and Canada will be the one to suffer”.

At the same time, an anonymous article was posted to WeChat targeting an incumbent MP, Kenny Chiu. In September 2021, Chiu introduced a private member's bill to create a Canadian foreign influence registry modelled on existing Australian and U.S. legislation. The registry law would have required individuals and groups acting on behalf of identified foreign authoritarian regimes, such as Russia, North Korea, Iran or China, to identify and register themselves. This would have threatened Chinese government influence operations in Canada. The anonymous WeChat article falsely accused Chiu of seeking to “suppress the Chinese community” through his bill.

Both the Global Times and WeChat narratives were shared on local Chinese Canadian digital and social media platforms.

According to Taiwan’s leading disinformation analysis NGO, Doublethink, Chinese state actors often use low-level disinformation disseminated on chat platforms—

The Chair: I'm going to pause this really quickly, Mr. Kolga. I know that you are trying to get a lot of information in. I can assure you that we will provide you avenues to provide us more information when we're outside of this hour.

With two official languages, receiving the message in the other language is something we need to slow down for a bit.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I will indeed.

The Chair: Okay. We want to hear what you have to say.

I'm going to continue the clock. You are currently at two minutes and 17 seconds.

It's over to you.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Perfect. Thank you.

According to Taiwan's leading disinformation analysis NGO, Doublethink, Chinese state actors often use low-level disinformation disseminated on chat platforms like WeChat and others as a method of attack. The method and content of the narratives spread about former MP Kenny Chiu are tactically consistent with those identified by Doublethink.

After analyzing open-source data and consulting with key stakeholders, we believed and continue to believe that the timing and content of these narratives were consistent with previous Chinese government information operations and indicated the likelihood of a coordinated operation targeting Chinese Canadian voters. We published our initial report on September 14, 2021, and a subsequent report in December. Researchers from the Atlantic Council's digital forensics lab and McGill University later confirmed our findings in separate independent reports.

Now I'll briefly speak a little bit about Russian interference.

Russian information and influence operations are persistent and they are growing. They do not turn on and off with election cycles and have intensified during the course of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Over the past 36 months, we have observed the Kremlin exploit the COVID pandemic by amplifying vaccine hesitancy and anti-lockdown narratives, a threat that I anticipated at the onset of the pandemic. These were key issues during the 2021 federal election. Recent Russian information operations have also focused on dehumanizing and marginalizing Canadians of Ukrainian heritage, including those elected to public office, regardless of political affiliation. Deputy Prime Minister Freeland has faced ongoing attacks since 2017 from the Russian embassy and domestic proxies aligned with it that accuse her of being a neo-Nazi.

Russia's primary and full-time focus is to undermine and destabilize our democracy by exploiting the most polarizing issues of the day. Their operations focus on amplifying and legitimizing narratives that support the extreme left and right so as to erode trust and cohesion within our society. These attacks affect our political environment and choices every day, not just during election periods.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Kolga. Believe it or not, I gave you an extra 45 seconds, and I can't wait to hear more from you.

With that, we are now going to Mr. Jim Judd.

I'll be a little lenient with you, but try to keep it to four minutes, if you can. Welcome.

Mr. Jim Judd (Former Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service, As an Individual): Thank you.

As noted, my name is Jim Judd. I am a retired federal public servant. I retired from the federal government in 2009. I am here today, I assume, because I was asked by the Privy Council Office several years ago to do an assessment of the critical election incident protocol that had been put in place creating a panel of senior officials for the writ period of the election to monitor potential foreign interference in the election of 2019.

I did the work. The report was published two and a half years ago or so. The work was done on the basis of interviews with a large number of people, including the members of the panel, security agencies, academics and former public servants, and a lot of research, mostly in public source material. In the course of doing my work, I did not have access to any of the intelligence that went to the committee and just relied on the interviews to get their perspectives on what had happened.

The review was mandated by the protocol itself, which said that following the election, there should be a review done.

That's essentially the short story, I hope.

The Chair: Is that it, Mr. Judd?

Mr. Jim Judd: I think so.

The Chair: I appreciate that.

Thank you so much for those words.

We are now going to start our opening round, with six minutes to Mr. Cooper.

[Translation]

After him will be Mr. Fergus, followed by Ms. Gaudreau and then Ms. Blaney.

Go ahead, Mr. Cooper. You have six minutes.

[English]

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I'll direct my questions to Mr. Kolga.

Mr. Kolga, you spoke about evidence that DisinfoWatch gathered respecting activities on the part of Chinese Communist state actors using social media platforms to spread disinformation against the Conservative Party generally and certain candidates specifically, with a real emphasis on the riding of Steveston—Richmond East and Kenny Chiu.

In the case of Kenny Chiu, and maybe speaking more broadly about this type of interference that occurred during the election, is there any indication that the interference materially affected the outcome of the election?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Thank you for the question.

It's incredibly hard to measure the impact of these sorts of operations on election outcomes. At the same time, we can't dismiss that they may have had an effect, but in this case it's certainly very difficult to measure. We can assume that these operations, which were in the Chinese language, targeting Canadians of Chinese heritage, probably connected with thousands of members of those communities. We can measure the impact on various forums and such. We can see how many people have accessed or commented on many of these posts.

Again, there's no evidence that the outcome of the election, whether in that electoral district or any others where there are high percentages of Chinese speakers, was directly affected or that the outcome would have changed because of this specific attack. The fact is that, again—

Mr. Michael Cooper: I'm sorry. My time is limited.

But it can't be ruled out, either.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: It cannot be ruled out.

Mr. Michael Cooper: You were speaking a little bit about the scope of the disinformation campaign. I will give you a bit of time to perhaps expand on exactly what occurred. How was this used? How many people might have come across some of this disinformation?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Again, if we're talking about this anonymous WeChat campaign, what happened was a narrative about Mr. Chiu and his legislation, the private member's bill that would have enacted a foreign influence registry. As I said in my introductory remarks, this legislation would have required actors advocating on behalf of specific foreign authoritarian regimes to register with the government.

This is something the Chinese government would not want to have enacted, so it's entirely possible that the narrative was placed onto WeChat—a platform, by the way, that is largely controlled by the Chinese government—by actors aligned with the Chinese government. WeChat is widely used by Chinese speakers around the world, including in this country.

The overall impact of that narrative is unknown, but the fact that it spread to various other platforms and forums—Chinese-speaking forums here in Canada and local media—does indicate that the narrative was widespread. It's likely to have been seen by tens of thousands of Chinese Canadians, perhaps hundreds of thousands.

Again, whether it changed their voting intent during the election is unknown, but the fact that so many people saw that narrative should be of concern, and I think we can certainly assume that was an effort to undermine the integrity of our elections.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you for that.

I want to ask you a little bit about the critical election incident public protocol. It is a mechanism that is purportedly designed to be transparent, to bring it to the attention of Canadians that interference is happening during the course of the campaign. It appears— in fact, I think it was established—that the critical election incident public protocol was not invoked. There was no public notification that was provided. Voters in Steveston—Richmond East, etc., would not have been informed about this disinformation campaign, and the threshold is fairly high.

Could you maybe speak to that protocol and the threshold that must be satisfied? Do you have any thoughts on that? On the one hand, it probably should be fairly high, but on the other hand, timing is limited. How can this protocol be used or how can it be improved to provide greater transparency in a timely manner?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Well, the protocol was introduced before the 2019 election, along with several other measures, including the continuation of the RRM, which is critically important to protecting our democracy. I think that was a very good first step. In 2019, it appears to have done its work. Whether it was to deter foreign actors from trying to interfere...it seems to have done its work.

I cannot comment on the thresholds that were put in place. With this incident and the fact that Chinese state media, Global Times, was directly trying to interfere in our election by injecting various narratives into it, I'm not sure how that fits with those thresholds. I unfortunately can't comment on that.

My understanding, from reading the publicly available information, is that when that threshold is met, the political parties involved and the candidates who are targeted are notified, and the public is notified.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

We now go to Mr. Fergus for six minutes.

Hon. Greg Fergus: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses. I'm less familiar with Mr. Kolga, but I have the utmost respect for his work. I'm quite familiar with Mr. Judd, as well as his work and career in the public service.

Thank you for your service to Canada, Mr. Judd.

Mr. Kolga, your opening statement was extremely insightful and relevant. You said that foreign actors looking to destabilize our democracy exploit polarizing issues that already exist in Canadian society. Can you tell us more about that? Can you give us any examples? How do foreign actors do that?

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Thank you very much for that question.

I outlined how some Chinese state actors were doing that during the previous election. They were using state media outlets such as Global Times, which is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. They use platforms like that to inject false narratives into our information environment and the global information environment. The hope for them is that they are picked up by various actors domestically and spread in that way.

Russia, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, has been active on an ongoing basis. Their operations never stop. They never sleep. They are constantly seeking to exploit the most polarizing issues in our society.

Certainly during the COVID pandemic, they were extraordinarily active, promoting anti-vaccination narratives and anti-lockdown narratives. They were promoting anti-government narratives at the same time. During that period, we saw a number of domestic anti- vaccination and anti-lockdown organizations amplify those narratives.

Indeed, all of that crescendoed in February of this year during the Ottawa truck protest. We saw RT, Russia's state media channel— which used to be available on our public airwaves and is no longer, thankfully—broadcasting interviews with extremists inside that protest who were exploiting those protests to promote anti-government narratives. The leaders of these anti-vaccination groups who were given a platform on RT were calling for the removal of our government, in fact.

The Twitter platforms of those organizations, later in February, when Russia invaded Ukraine, switched their narratives from anti- vaccination, anti-lockdown and anti-government narratives to ones that were explicitly anti-Ukrainian. There were certain tweets where those organizations were directly taking statements from the Russian embassy in Canada and retweeting them.

This is the ultimate objective of some of those organizations: to take those state narratives, find local actors who will amplify them, and affect the discussion and local debate on those issues.

[Translation]

Hon. Greg Fergus: Thank you very much for those examples. They were very helpful.

Let's go back six months to what happened during the occupation in Ottawa.

Do you think Russian influence on social media was as impactful as that of the Chinese government or actors associated with China?

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I would say, in my assessment, that the Russian government is very effective at finding the most polarizing issues and amplifying them and finding the actors domestically to amplify them.

China is not as sophisticated when it comes to its operations, so I would think that the Russian government's efforts during that period were far more impactful than the Chinese government's.

[Translation]

Hon. Greg Fergus: I have one last question for Mr. Kolga, before I move on to Mr. Judd.

Do you think Russia's activities have as big of an impact on Canadian voters as China's?

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: For clarification, do you mean during the election? Okay.

It is hard to measure. As I mentioned in my opening statement, Russia's efforts are ongoing. They are persistent, so I think that the overall impact of Russian information operations may have been more significant during that election.

China targeted specific ridings and, in those ridings, the impact was far greater than Russia's. If we're looking at the ultimate outcome of that election, it's hard to say which government would have had a greater impact.

[Translation]

Hon. Greg Fergus: I don't have much time left, but I have the same question for you, Mr. Judd.

Do you think Russian and Chinese influence had the same impact on the election results?

[English]

Mr. Jim Judd: What I am about to say is based on public source information. I haven't seen a piece of intelligence for a very long time, three grandchildren ago. Public source information is quite extraordinary—not just here. It's, in fact, global—Europe, the United States and so on.

Certainly, I don't think I would disagree with anything Mr. Kolga said about the activities of these individuals. For me, it was quite a new experience, because when I was working, this was not an issue. There was a very different basket of priorities for CSIS and national security issues in my time.

The Chair: Thank you. We'll come back to you again. [Translation]

Go ahead, Ms. Gaudreau. You have six minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you to the witnesses.

Just a heads-up that I have two questions for Mr. Kolga and two questions for Mr. Judd.

Mr. Kolga said that a protocol was established in 2019 to protect democracy and had not changed since, so I'd like some clarification.

Very quickly, I'd like Mr. Kolga to tell me what hasn't changed since the protocol was introduced in 2019.

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I'm not sure how much has changed within the protocol or whether the thresholds have changed. I have no information about that.

The threat certainly has evolved. That's what has changed since 2019. In 2019, we believed that the threat to our democracy was exclusively targeting our elections and writ periods, whereas since that period, I think our understanding of the threat has evolved. I've mentioned several times during my testimony that the threats—certainly from Russia, and from China as well—are persistent. That's what has changed.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you.

I gather that the protocol isn't adequate to respond to growing threats. I have another question for you, and then I'll move on to Mr. Judd.

Mr. Kolga said the public needed to be educated. We talked about transparency and education with the witnesses in the previous panel. I'd like Mr. Kolga to tell me whether the public was ever informed of foreign interference. If so, what information can he provide to the committee on the source of that activity, for the purposes of our report?

I'm somewhat naive about all this, so I'd like to know what being advised looks like.

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Again, thank you for that question.

We, DisinfoWatch, did try to inform the public when these efforts were brought to our attention in early September. We took the time to look at the information we received. We tried to process it. We couldn't necessarily trace it directly to the Chinese government, but given the nature of the messages that were targeting Mr. Chiu, that campaign in British Columbia, and there was also another—

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Madam Chair, my question was actually about the information that was shared with the public or the people concerned. Is it possible for the committee to get those communications and links? That's what I wanted to know.

I'll let Mr. Kolga send us that information. Now I'll turn to Mr. Judd.

Mr. Judd, I heard you say in your opening statement that the Privy Council Office had asked you to clarify the critical election incident public protocol. You said you didn't have access to certain information. What information were you missing in order to do the job properly? It is possible, however, that I didn't hear you correctly.

[English]

Mr. Jim Judd: Thank you.

What I intended to say in my opening comments was that in the course of doing my work, I had no access to any of the intelligence that went to the panel from SITE, the integrated intelligence organization.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Madam Chair, I asked why the witness didn't have access to that information.

[English]

Mr. Jim Judd: It was classified above my security classification level, and given the time that was at play, it would have taken quite a long time to re-establish what I used to have as a security classification. That's essentially it.

I would say, though, with respect to this issue, that my understanding from the 2019 election was that the political parties were privy to SITE information on an ongoing basis throughout the election and even before. I understand that this continued to be the case in the last election as well. Chances are that someone in your party knows a lot more about this than I do.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Madam Chair, I'm trying to educate myself here, because foreign interference is a subject I know little about, and I'm learning things that are extremely distressing.

My next question is for whoever wishes to answer.

What are the tools we need? We heard suggestions in terms of what Five Eyes partners were doing, but I'd like to know what the first step is in order to reduce the spread of this activity.

I think I have a minute left, so I'd like the witnesses to say a few words about that.

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I'll quickly give a few of my thoughts.

I strongly believe that exposing these efforts, analyzing them and explaining them is incredibly important. That's the work we do at DisinfoWatch. I think the government should expand the initiative it's already taken with the critical election incident public protocol and make that into a full-time organization. That includes civil society, academia, media members and representatives from all of the major parties in Canada as well as social media—

The Chair: Thank you.

Ms. Blaney, go ahead for six minutes.

Ms. Rachel Blaney (North Island—Powell River, NDP):

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to both of the witnesses for your testimony today. I'm going to start my questioning with Mr. Kolga.

In one of your responses to a question, you said very clearly that Russia never sleeps. I thought that was an important thing to pick up on. We know that Russia never sleeps and that it is constantly looking at ways to create destabilized realities within other countries. I think all of us are concerned.

Really, this study is about two things: ensuring that Canadians have confidence in our electoral process and systems and ensuring that we have the best protection from any foreign threats. We know that the more disinformation gets out there, the less Canadians believe in the systems we have. They're winning, and we can't let that happen.

I'm just wondering if you could talk about the fact that Russia never sleeps and how, not only during elections but also outside of those and even pre-election, that is a problem.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Thank you very much for that question.

Absolutely, Russia does not sleep. Russia has been engaging in disinformation and influence operations for a very long time—nearly a century. Joseph Stalin began creating deep fakes, if you will, by doctoring photographs, already in the 1930s.

It engaged in this throughout the Cold War. Canadians of central and eastern European heritage were constantly targeted with Russian disinformation during that time because they were critical of the Soviet occupation of their countries. They were often labelled as neo-Nazis and such. Those sorts of narratives were intended to dehumanize, marginalize and silence them, and create second-class citizens of those Canadians.

We're seeing very much that same sort of process right now during this war with Ukraine. The Ukrainian diaspora, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, has been targeted with similar narratives and operations.

When we look at Russian disinformation operations in general, all of that is intended to break down, geopolitically, Canadian and

U.S. support for NATO. It's intended to break down the cohesion within that alliance because, as we've seen, Russia is unable to compete with us when we're united.

Domestically, in Canada, they try to break down the cohesion within our society. That means breaking down trust in our democratic institutions, in all of our elected officials—all of you in this committee—and in our media and such. It does that by injecting different pieces of disinformation, conspiracy theories and such, in hopes that various far-left and far-right extremists will pick them up. They hope those narratives will eventually filter into our mainstream media and interfere in our normal democratic debate. That is the ultimate outcome of Russian information operations.

Unless we stand up to it and make an effort to expose narratives, as you are doing right now with this study, and have an active discussion on how we address this challenge, they will win. They have a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars for these efforts. They are doing this day and night. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of people employed to undertake this task of injecting those narratives, of using social media and of exploiting our freedoms to gain the advantage.

We definitely need to step up our game. I think that during the current Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Canadian government has started to acknowledge the breadth of this threat and is taking measures to address it. We need to continue to do that. As I was trying to say in my previous answer, we need to take a whole-of-society approach and an inclusive approach. That includes media, social media giants, civil society and, of course, government and our elected officials. We need to have that discussion all together because that's the only way we're going to innoculate ourselves against this and defend against foreign disinformation operations in the long term.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: I think that's really interesting. I think of the convoy that was outside and how many people were yelling about fake news. I saw reporters right in front saying things like, “Say whatever you like. We're totally open. You're on live television.” People were just losing that connection with the understanding of our reality.

My next question is really around targeting marginalized groups. I think of myself; I represent rural and remote communities. I'm just curious about the strategies that could be used against more remote communities, marginalized communities, indigenous communities and ethnic groups. I think those would be specific and targeted.

I'm just curious whether you have any feedback on that.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: That's a great question. It deserves its own study, I think.

We need to be working with local media and smaller media organizations that speak to these groups to ensure they get the good information, the facts and the truth.

We've been reading reports about how smaller media organizations are simply going out of business. They're disappearing. A robust and trustworthy media is one way we can defend against foreign disinformation. Certainly making sure that vulnerable groups—minority groups and such—have access to that information is an extremely important way, and I believe an effective way, we can combat disinformation and misinformation.

The Chair: Thank you.

Next we have Mr. Calkins for five minutes, followed by Ms. O'Connell.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Kolga, I guess, basically, if I can summarize what you're saying, in an environment where Canadians might be disenfranchised—if you're an oil patch worker who lost his job, if you're somebody whose kid was kicked out of college or university because they didn't want to get vaccinated, or if you lost your job or were unable to travel—these create breeding grounds for frustration. It can be anything. It can be any type of source of that frustration.

I'm from the west; I'm from Alberta. I know what western alienation does. I know how my constituents think, because I think just like they do. I have been here for 17 years, through a Liberal government and a Conservative government. I can tell you that people's attitudes and their frustrations are completely different depending on who's governing the country. If we actually have...and the Prime Minister of this country's own caucus colleagues have basically stood and said that he has a wedge, stigmatize, divide approach. Does that provide fertile breeding grounds for these kinds of organizations, like Russia, to manipulate the Canadian public?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Yes, absolutely. The Russian government exploits those grievances, and it aggravates them. That is exactly how it operates.

I should remind you, though, that it has been doing this for quite some time. Just about a year and a half ago, we did a study of over 100 Twitter accounts that had been taken down by Twitter. We had access to the deleted tweets of those accounts that were connected to the Russian government, and they went back to 2014.

In 2014, those accounts were actively doing the same. They were attacking the Harper government on various issues. They are agnostic with regard to any sort of political party. They will sink their fangs into the left and the right, and they will tug on any specific issue until it tears us apart. This is what they do.

It doesn't matter who's in government, whether it's the Conservatives one day, the Liberals the next, the NDP another day, or perhaps the Bloc one day. All of those parties—even when they are in opposition—will be attacked when they are critical of the Russian regime, and, again, those grievances that do emerge toward whichever party is governing will be exploited by Russia.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: Given the fact that in your testimony you have just said that it doesn't really matter who the political actors are who are making the decisions of the day, our democratic institutions are vulnerable to these attacks regardless.

I just went and looked. WeChat has 1.25 billion users globally and over a million users in Canada. I just went onto Facebook to DisinfoWatch's page, and you are lucky, sir—and this is not a slight against you in any way, shape or form—to get into three digits when it comes to views of your explainer videos and so on.

Can you give this committee any indication of what needs to happen? Salacious information or misinformation seems to be gobbled up and consumed by the consumer a lot more readily than the truth is. As parliamentarians, how do we bridge that gap?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: That's a very good question. I should add that we do try, and our impact is largely in the media and in mainstream media when they report on the reports that we have. You shouldn't take that from our Facebook views.

I think the problem is quite far gone at this point. I don't think we can put the genie back into the bottle, but we can take measures to innoculate future generations. That means ensuring that we look at countries like Finland, which has enacted early childhood digital media literacy strategies, making sure that's in our curricula, informing Canadians, and doing what we can to expose these disinformation narratives so that elected officials, our media, and anybody who's interested in finding the facts have that information available. I think that's what we need to start looking at right now because, as I said, we can't put the genie back in the bottle. I think these information operations, the disinformation and the polarization of our society are almost at a point of no return.

Mr. Blaine Calkins: In the context of a Canadian general election or even a by-election, notwithstanding that we don't want to put very many You know, we enjoy our freedom. We enjoy free

speech. We enjoy all of these things. Every western liberalized democracy does. However, should we consider or should this committee be recommending that those platforms be somehow identified or taken off-line during, say, an electoral writ period when we know full well that certain types of platforms are specifically being used?

The Chair: I'm going to ask that you hold that thought.

I'm going to send the screen over to Ms. O'Connell for five minutes.

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell: Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Kolga, I'm going to start with you.

Mr. Judd, I hope I'll have some time. I have some questions for you as well.

Mr. Kolga, I found your last intervention particularly interesting. It was about making sure that elected officials have the disinformation and information available to them. I transport in my mind to your comments earlier, too, about Russian TV broadcasting the convoy and how awkward it must be for those elected officials who posed with convoy members or who brought them coffee, and then they could be broadcast on Russian TV after that. Your comments about elected officials having this information, understanding their role in the very disinformation and the agents of Russian foreign actors are quite interesting.

I want to get to my questions around some of your comments on disinformation and that you can't discredit what could have been an outcome in Mr. Chiu's election. You spoke about the involvement of Chinese agents or activity from China. You also spoke about ongoing activity from Russia, and you specifically named Minister Freeland as somebody to receive that attention from these actors.

I have a couple of questions here, and then I'll leave it to you. How do you distinguish that ongoing Russian activity against Minister Freeland doesn't have any impact but activity during the election period for Mr. Chiu could have had an impact? I think that disinformation or activity from foreign state actors is real, but I think we have to be very careful about certain parties using it as the excuse for a loss.

I can tell you that the voters in Steveston—Richmond East rejected Mr. Chiu in 2015. Then he won the election in 2019. Looking at the numbers of the 2019 and the 2021 elections, there was a difference of 4,412 votes for Mr. Chiu between those elections. I also note that, from the 2019 election to the 2021 election, voter turnout was smaller by about 3,070 votes. One could argue—I'm sure the Conservatives would—that the voter turnout was smaller because of the disinformation and the campaigns from China. I'd also like to point out that, in my election, from 2019 to 2021, my voter turnout was smaller by over 5,000 votes, which is more. How can you determine that, if the electors in 2015 rejected Mr. Chiu...? Voter turnout was smaller across the country. How can you determine that the Chinese actions had an impact and that the Russian actions had no impact for Minister Freeland? Do we run the risk of playing this game of where impact was had versus protecting our democracy overall from foreign interference, instead of trying to pick winners and losers riding by riding, when you can't determine it with any data?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: To address your introductory remark about certain politicians posing with members of the convoy protest in Ottawa, having elected officials pose with these people or supporting people who may have legitimate grievances is not disinformation. That's part of our democratic processes. Whether you agree with them or disagree with them, that's not necessarily disinformation.

What I was trying to say was that RT does exploit fringes within that movement who are advocating for the destabilization of our democracy.

As for the outcome in Mr. Chiu's riding, I don't know. I don't know what the history is there. Again, my point was that that specific election was targeted. He, as a candidate, was targeted with foreign operations. Again, we can't measure the impact of that, so I can't—

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell: I'm sorry to interrupt.

Was Minister Freeland's election also targeted by Russia?

Mr. Marcus Kolga: If you'd let me get to that, I will.

Minister Freeland has been targeted since 2017 because of her involvement when she became the Minister of Foreign Affairs. As soon as she became Minister of Foreign Affairs, overnight a campaign appeared. We know from various reports by Canadian reporters—

The Chair: I'm going to have to stop it there.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: This is a very important issue, though.

The Chair: It is very important. We are going to make sure that you have the avenues to provide us information.

I have a tough job and I need to keep the train on the tracks. Madame Gaudreau, you have two and a half minutes.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think we can all agree on the fact that whatever the disinformation and whoever the target, it's unacceptable.

The past little while, I have been trying to raise issues so we can have a constructive discussion, but I'm disappointed by what I'm hearing.

Ultimately, we are going to produce a report with findings. My questions are about how we can do better.

Earlier, Mr. Kolga said that Finland had a digital literacy strategy, and I'd like to know which other countries are doing things we should replicate.

I have just one question for both witnesses.

Finland appears to be setting a good example. On a scale of one to 10, where does Finland rank for its efforts to counter disinformation?

Where does Canada rank on that scale? I'd like both witnesses to answer.

The Chair: Mr. Judd can go first.

Did you get all of that in English, Mr. Judd? Did you understand the question?

[English]

Mr. Jim Judd: I understood the question.

I'm still working on the answer.

The Chair: I'm going to go over to Mr. Kolga very quickly, and then we'll go to Mr. Judd.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I think we do some things well. I think we do other things not so well.

I couldn't give you a specific number, but I think we should be looking to Finland, which is doing a good job. I think we should be looking to Sweden—

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: We're just talking. I asked for a number just to get a sense of how Canada measures up: not bad, average or very good.

Where is Finland on a scale of one to 10, as far as its regime goes? Would you give it an eight out of 10? Where does Canada fall—

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: If we take Finland, Sweden, the Baltic states, and Taiwan, which are doing this and have been doing this well for a long time, if they are the baseline, if they are the 10, then I think maybe we're on the way to approaching a seven.

The Chair: That was believable.

Mr. Judd, go ahead.

Mr. Jim Judd: The problem we're talking about, disinformation, is a global one. Lots of other governments are asking the same questions you are. Right now, the British Parliament is doing new legislation in response to the Russian interference in Brexit and the election at the same time.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Judd. [Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Madam Chair, I lost some time

because of the interpretation. What would you give it?

The Chair: You're out of time, Ms. Gaudreau. We are moving on to Ms. Blaney.

You have two and a half minutes, Ms. Blaney. Go ahead. [English]

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I have one question for Mr. Kolga. I want to come back to the question I asked earlier about rural and remote communities, indigenous, ethnic groups, and marginalized groups.

You spoke a lot about small, local, community media and how important it is to have those sustainable systems in place so they can provide information in a trusted way and that they're trusted resources. I also know a lot of these communities use social media as a function of connection in the community.

Could you talk about the threats that could be targeted to those particular groups? I think they're unique and I think that in some ways, if somebody got into that system, trust could be built very quickly. I'm worried about that disinformation, especially recognizing that due to language and remoteness fighting that disinformation could be even more difficult.

Mr. Marcus Kolga: I completely agree with you. Social media is clearly being exploited to connect with and divide these communities, to influence them in various ways. I think there is a really big problem there. On how we address it, I don't think we've even really started discussing that on a national level.

This is why for the past several years, I have been calling for a whole-of-society approach to this problem. That means bringing social media companies to the table. I am sure they are also interested, as it's in their own interest to clean up their act. Making sure they sit down and have this conversation about how these vulnerable communities are protected, and what sort of measures can be put in place to do that, is something the government needs to be taking a lead on, along with all the other groups I mentioned earlier.

It's only in that way we're going to address this problem. We can't just leave it to social media to do it on their own. We certainly can't leave it up to these vulnerable communities. We can't just leave them to their own devices to do this, because it needs some leadership. I think that's one place where the federal government and other levels of government can surely step in to help.

Ms. Rachel Blaney: Do you want to add something, Mr. Judd?

Mr. Jim Judd: It's a big problem. I agree with Mr. Kolga in respect of a whole-of-society approach. If you want to look at a robust regime for dealing with social media disinformation, I suggest you look at Singapore, which enacted laws in the last several years specifically to address social media disinformation campaigns around elections. Now they're adding more to it with respect to hate issues, irrespective of what they are.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Sorry to cut you off, Mr. Judd.

Go ahead, Mr. Berthold. You have two minutes.

Mr. Luc Berthold (Mégantic—L'Érable, CPC): I'll keep it short.

I want to raise a few things.

Mr. Kolga and Mr. Judd, can you provide the committee with some written information on Finland's regime? What programs exactly has Finland put in place to educate youth?

Mr. Judd, if you have additional information about Singapore that you could share with the committee, we would appreciate it.

Now I'd like to address a comment one of my fellow members made.

Disinformation and foreign interference, whether the target is a member of the Liberals, Conservatives, Bloc Québécois or NDP, is unacceptable—period. It makes no difference. It's unacceptable. We need to do everything in our power to combat foreign influence in every riding so that Canadians are the only ones deciding who gets elected. I think that's the whole premise of today's study.

Mr. Kolga, how much of the responsibility for the spread of disinformation can be attributed to Facebook, Twitter and other social media algorithms?

[English]

Mr. Marcus Kolga: Thank you for that question.

Certainly the revenue of social media companies relies on the number of eyeballs that fall onto any piece of content, and they want to make sure that their users remain on their platforms as long as possible so they can expose them to advertising.

I think many of these social media companies have recognized their responsibility in ensuring that disinformation narratives are pushed lower down in their algorithms.

I think Twitter has, certainly over the past 12 months, and I would say even more so during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, really put in an effort to clean up their act. We'll see what happens now with the change in ownership. We may slide backwards there, but that remains to be seen.

At Facebook, I think there is a lot of work that remains to be done. I think YouTube has been quite good in labelling foreign state media when it comes to those platforms.

Again, a lot more needs to be done. [Translation]

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Kolga. I have to cut you off there. You have some homework to do, because we need your answers in writing. Please send them to the committee clerk.

Next we go to Ms. O'Connell for two minutes. [English]

Ms. Jennifer O'Connell: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to my colleague.

I didn't have time in the last round, so I do want to get to Mr. Judd with my questions here.

I was actually familiar with your report when I was a member of NSICOP. Obviously, we can't discuss that here in this forum.

I just want to clarify, with respect to an earlier question, the mandate of your role. Can you explain further? It's my understanding that the reason the intelligence wouldn't have been provided to you was that the mandate of your role was to review the process. It's not about individual instances. You weren't auditing, let's say, the process the last time, but you were reviewing the process itself. In that, did you look at the pre-writ question of having this process in place for foreign interference activity during elections?

Mr. Jim Judd: Thank you for clarifying what I meant to say earlier.

The issue of the writ is one that's always bothered me in this respect. Just to go back to what Mr. Kolga was saying, this is an infinite issue. An average election is 50 days. There are 315 other days in the year in which there can be all kinds of mischief, which can, in some fashion, have an impact on politics, but more importantly, I think, on broader social cohesion in this country and others.

The Chair: Thank you so much.

I would like to thank both of our guests for their time with us today. Please do not hesitate to share information through the clerk for committee members to consider. Just to clarify from earlier, if you ask the clerk not to share it publicly, the clerk will ensure that the information is available to members, but not to the public. If anything else can be made publicly available. If you can just deci‐

pher that, we will ensure that it is managed and handled with the care you require.

With that, I wish you both a good day.

For committee members, we are returning to our constituencies next week for Veterans' Week. I hope you take time to think about how we are able to enjoy the freedoms we do today. We will return on November 15 to a subcommittee meeting, so all members will not need to be present, but subcommittee members will be present for Tuesday, November 15.

Throughout the constituency week, you will receive one if not both reports, and we will return on November 17 as a full committee in camera to look at the draft report.

I wish you the best. Keep well and safe.

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Transcript of Study Meeting #3 (November 22, 2022)

44th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

EVIDENCE

NUMBER 041

PUBLIC PART ONLY - PARTIE PUBLIQUE SEULEMENT

Tuesday, November 22, 2022

Chair: The Honourable Bardish Chagger

[English]

The Chair (Hon. Bardish Chagger (Waterloo, Lib.)): Welcome to the second hour of our meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

I would like to welcome our Chief Electoral Officer, Monsieur Stéphane Perrault, to PROC again.

Thank you for always taking the time. With that, I will pass the floor over to you.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault (Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Since my November 1 appearance, I have read news reports of foreign interference in the 2019 election. I am not in a position to speak to the accuracy of the contents of the recent news articles, but what I can say is this.

First, there were concerns prior to the 2019 election regarding the risks of foreign interference through various means. This is why, as part of a range of actions in preparing for the 2019 election, national security agencies took part in a meeting of the advisory committee of political parties, under the auspices of Elections Canada, to raise awareness regarding possible attempts by foreign state actors to interfere in the election. As I said in my last appearance, election security is a team sport.

[Translation]

Second, there are clear protocols in place among national security agencies, Elections Canada, the Commissioner of Canada Elections and other law enforcement agencies to allow for the sharing of information based on respective mandates.

The Canada Elections Act very clearly prohibits foreign contributions to candidates. According to the protocols in place, if there is information that would assist the investigation of illegal contributions, it should be sent to the commissioner.

I will note, however, as I did previously, that interference by foreign states raises issues that go well beyond compliance with legislative provisions and involve state-to-state relations.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I welcome your questions.

The Chair: Thank you very much for your comments.

We will move to the first round of questions, where each member will have six minutes. Before we begin, I remind you that all comments should be addressed through the chair.

Mr. Cooper, you have the floor. [English]

Mr. Michael Cooper (St. Albert—Edmonton, CPC): Thank

you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Perrault. It's good to see you again before our committee.

You referenced in your testimony the Global News report. In the November 7 report and in an updated November 20 report, Global News stated that intelligence memos cautioned the Prime Minister and several cabinet ministers regarding a vast campaign of interference by Beijing in the 2019 federal election campaign.

Has the Prime Minister or anyone in his office reported to Elections Canada any particulars concerning a campaign of interference by Beijing?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I'm not aware of any specifics regarding campaigns of interference by Beijing other than what I've read in the news article.

Mr. Michael Cooper: So, the answer to my question is that no report has been made by the Prime Minister or anyone in his office.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, that is what I said. I would like to remind the committee that the mandate of the commissioner of Canada Elections, unlike my own mandate, is to investigate cases of non-compliance. If there is evidence to support an investigation regarding an offence under the Canada Elections Act, that information should go to the commissioner of Canada Elections.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Just to be clear, no report has been made from the Prime Minister to you or to the commissioner, or anyone in your office—

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I'm not aware of it.

Mr. Michael Cooper: — in his office.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Certainly not to my office or to me. I can't speak for the commissioner.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Can you undertake to find out from the commissioner?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think it's for her to speak to the committee, Madam Chair. If the committee wants to ask, perhaps by written means....I would note that the commissioner's independence is something that is very important, and that was very much a subject of legislation in recent years. There is a very clear distinction from her mandates—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Well, perhaps we do need to hear from the commissioner, just as we had both you and her on November 1.

Similarly, can you confirm whether any reports to Elections Canada have been made by any cabinet ministers or any officials in their office?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I've not received any reports regarding specific instances of non-compliance with the legislation or specific instances of Chinese interference in the election.

Mr. Michael Cooper: You're not aware that the commissioner has, from any minister.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I'm not aware that the commissioner has. I'm aware that we....

As we prepare for the election, we have extensive discussions with partners. We do tabletop exercises at the different levels of each organization—DG, ADM, deputy minister—so that people understand the roles and responsibilities and are able to share information.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Yes. Thank you, commissioner.

I take it that no investigation has been initiated.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I can't speak to that. I have no way of speaking to that. The law is very clear about the role and the commissioner's limitations in sharing information.

Mr. Michael Cooper: So you can't speak to that.

Perhaps you may be able to elaborate on answers provided by the commissioner to our committee that I received, that committee members received, yesterday. As you will recall, on November 1 the commissioner referenced that in the 2019 general election, there were 10 separate allegations of foreign interference brought to the attention of Elections Canada. She went on to indicate that there were 158 complaints.

I'm wondering if you could answer whether any of those 10 separate allegations of foreign interference concerned the CCP.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I'm not in a position to speak to that. Again, the work of the commissioner is done independently and in confidence.

Mr. Michael Cooper: You're not able to speak to any particulars concerning those allegations.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That is correct.

Mr. Michael Cooper: You're not able to shed any light to this committee on—

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That is correct. I can speak about roles and responsibilities—

Mr. Michael Cooper: Okay. Thank you for that.

You did state—

The Chair: I am going to pause for a second. We have spent a lot of time on this committee understanding the important work that interpreters do. We are a country with two official languages. Therefore, I'm going to ask that, as committee members, we ask questions through the chair and we let our witness— whom we invited to the committee, remember—answer those questions.

With that, Mr. Cooper, you have a minute and a half left. I do not want to hear two voices speaking, from anyone, at the same time. It's important that we actually get to the work we are doing.

It's back to you, Mr. Cooper.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Perrault, in your testimony you said, “The Canada Elections Act very clearly prohibits foreign contributions to candidates.” Can you elaborate on some of the penalties for either funnelling money that is foreign or directing money to candidates or knowingly receiving such monies?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, if the committee wishes, I do have a table of the various offences that could come into play in this situation. I'm happy to share that with the committee rather than reciting them.

It is correct that the law very clearly prohibits contributions from any entity other than an individual who is either a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident. Any other contribution is illegal. It is also illegal to hide the source of a contribution and to direct contributions to other persons. There are various offences for that. Typically, the highest penalty is a year imprisonment.

I have a full table that I'd be happy to share with the committee.

Mr. Michael Cooper: What constitutes the highest penalty?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I believe it's one year, depending on the offence.

The Chair: That's it? Excellent. Thank you.

We will now go to Mr. Turnbull for six minutes.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull (Whitby, Lib.): Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Perrault, for coming back to our committee. You're making regular appearances here, which we appreciate.

I want to start with a very simple, clear question.

In your opinion, was the election in 2019 fair and free in Canada?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I have no reason, Madam Chair, to believe that the election overall was not a free and fair election.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: What if I were to ask you the same about the election in 2021? Was that election free and fair, as a democratic election should be, in your opinion?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: In my opinion, there's no reason to believe that it was not a free and fair election.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: When you say, “no reason to believe,” I would say that you, of all people, would have oversight and ability to see many of the factors that lead you to make that judgment. That's a pretty important blanket statement you're making. How can you be certain that your judgment is accurate? What are you taking into consideration when you say that our elections, in both instances, were free and fair?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I was careful, Madam Chair, to speak in the negative, in the sense that from what I know, I have no reason to doubt that it was free and fair.

I am accountable for the overall conduct of the election. Of course, in all elections there are issues that we encounter and we've seen, and we've spoken in this committee about cases, for example, of incorrect information about the voting process, which we seek to correct and make sure electors are able to vote.

There may be offences that are committed that we find out about after the fact, and there may be investigations that are or are not under way that I would not know about, but with the information that I have, I have no reason to believe that the election was not a free and fair election.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you. Okay.

Along similar lines, do you have any reason to believe that in either 2019 or 2021 the federal elections were disrupted or compromised by foreign interference?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I have no specific intelligence or evidence in that regard.

What I will say is that through our relationship with the national security agencies, we are—and we were prior to both elections— aware that this was an area of risk and there was an interest in certain countries in conducting various forms of disruption or interference in the elections. This is one of the reasons why we held a meeting with political parties and the national security agencies to start raising awareness and build a relationship between the various players in order to protect the election.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: What steps have been taken to protect the election? I'm sure you have specific examples.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: For example, certainly in our case, one of the key aspects that we need to do is work with the cybersecurity experts and the Government of Canada to secure our infrastructure so that we are able to actually deliver the election and that we do not suffer from cyber-attacks.

We also take extensive steps to inform Canadians and inform the media of the procedures that we follow in order for ensuring that the vote is fair. We have a communications role to play during the election to educate Canadians and help them understand their rights and what they have to do. We also provide training to parties and candidates regarding obligations—their financial obligations and their reporting requirements—so there's a range of activities that we undertake to ensure the fairness of the election.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Okay. That's great. Do you have any reason to believe that Canadians' ability to vote was compromised in any way by foreign election interference in either the 2019 or the 2021 general election?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Generally speaking, I would say not. As I indicated to this committee, in the past there have been cases of incorrect information on the voting process. It's very difficult to ascertain whether incorrect information originates from a domestic or a foreign source. Whichever the source, we do rectify the information.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you.

In terms of election financing, I understand that—you've said it and I think Mr. Cooper also made mention of this in his questioning—there were limits on foreign contributions to candidates, i.e., there is none allowable, so that's good, obviously, as we can all agree.

How do our election financing rules stack up against those of other jurisdictions around the world? My understanding is that they're pretty stringent, which is a good thing for us. Could you give us some details on that?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think that overall, Madam Chair, we have a very robust regime of political financing, with a mix of private and public funding, which I think is healthy. We have strong disclosure rules and low contribution limits. We do regulate a range of political entities, going from nomination contestants, electoral district associations, political parties and leadership contestants, so it's a very extensive regime.

It never is perfect. I've made recommendations to improve it, but I would say overall it's a very robust regime.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Can you explain what protocols are in place when Elections Canada becomes aware of a candidate violating the Canada Elections Act?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: If we have, through whatever source, grounds to believe or even suspect that there have been specific cases of non-compliance, we would necessarily refer that to the commissioner for her to investigate.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: When Elections Canada is alerted to a campaign breaking financing laws, how does Elections Canada respond? Do you alert the commissioner and they launch an investigation?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: The commissioner decides whether the facts warrant launching an investigation or a review.

Mr. Ryan Turnbull: Thank you, Mr. Perrault.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Turnbull. Next is Madam Gaudreau.

[Translation]

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau (Laurentides—Labelle, BQ):

Thank you, Madam Chair.

To be very honest, I have to say that a tremendous amount of information has been provided. I had a lot of questions to ask, but I'm going to go back to the basics. I have a good understanding of the issues related to cybersecurity and the steps or procedures to follow. Mr. Perrault, you said that the media and individuals were well aware. Could you elaborate on that? Maybe the interpretation was missing something.

I'll explain what I mean. In a way, we are told that the idea is to take action against people with bad intentions. At the end of the day, there are indeed people here who seek power or don't want to lose it. From your point of view, what can we learn from your exchanges to ensure that citizens have confidence in our democracy? Does Elections Canada have everything it needs to determine that the Canada Elections Act is compliant or is insufficient?

I would like you to talk about what measures you have and what is missing. I know very well that we will talk to the commissioner, but I will let you answer my question.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: It is important for members of the committee and those who are listening to us to understand that ensuring the security of the election is not just Elections Canada's business. When we talk about what we do to ensure that elections are fair and secure, people need to understand that many stakeholders have a role to play. For example, local police forces can act when there is interference, and I am not talking about interference in the sense of foreign interference, but rather issues related to public safety. Moreover, in the last election, provincial and federal public health agencies had a role to play. So there are a lot of stakeholders.

With respect to national security, there are the national security agencies. I know that the committee will be hearing from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. The Canadian Centre for Cyber Security supports us in terms of the security of our IT infrastructure. So a number of stakeholders are involved.

In the case of Elections Canada, we need to distinguish between the role of the Chief Electoral Officer and the Commissioner of Canada Elections. The Chief Electoral Officer is responsible for enforcing the act, and this includes ensuring that Canadians understand their rights and how to vote. The Chief Electoral Officer must also ensure that candidates and parties understand their obligations, including those under the political financing rules, and know what they can and cannot accept. In this regard, manuals are prepared and training is provided. So there's a set of activities underway to make sure that the regime is working properly.

If there are cases involving potential violations of the act, it is the role of the commissioner and her office to investigate, independent of Elections Canada.

When we talk about the different actors, it is important to understand that they have very distinct accountabilities. Personally, I report to Parliament through this committee; I do not report to a minister, unlike the national security agencies.

Therefore, we are careful to talk about our respective areas of responsibility and mandates, while ensuring good collaboration between the different departments and agencies.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: How do we justify the current information gaps? On the one hand, we are told by the media that there is enough evidence to say that there is the appearance of for‐eign interference in 11 constituencies. On the other hand, we are told that this is not true, that no information was provided, and that they are trying to throw a wrench in the works.

What is the job of Elections Canada, when we see that the commissioner is doing investigations? I don't understand anything anymore. Help me: what can I tell my constituents about the last election?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: In general, I think we can talk about a fair election. I have no reason to doubt that.

We have to be careful about newspaper articles and the media. I don't want to question the journalistic work, but there was no investigation. We don't know what happened or which constituencies are affected. We don't know if money was given to candidates for their campaigns or for personal use. Are we talking about corruption of individuals or influence in the financing of elections? I don't have that information.

So we have to be careful when reading a media article before making a statement about the fairness of an election and the consequences that may result. That said—

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: I will continue with my last question, as I only have about 30 seconds left.

Based on your expertise, is the Canada Elections Act sound? Do we have everything we need?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think we have an excellent regime. Having said that, some things could be improved. I've shared that with the committee and I can elaborate on it as needed. All in all, I think our political finance regime is the envy of just about every other regime in the world.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: I am glad about that.

Earlier, we were talking about the measures and the steps to be taken. Of course, as you say, the commissioner has to do her investigation. However, once you have that information, what are the steps to be taken to disclose it to whom it may concern? Earlier, you mentioned ministers and the entire government.

What is the disclosure process in that respect?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: We don't know if there are facts that would lead to an investigation. Again, this is just a newspaper article. You can make assumptions when you read an article; we all do, it's normal. You can assume that money was used to fund campaigns. If that is the case and there is evidence, it should be forwarded to the commissioner. However, I don't know if that is the case. If the commissioner decides to investigate because she feels there is sufficient evidence to do so, the investigation will run its course. Normally, at the end of the investigation, the commissioner will take action, which may or may not become public, depending on the outcome of the investigation.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Blaikie, go ahead for six minutes.

[English]

Mr. Daniel Blaikie (Elmwood—Transcona, NDP): Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

I appreciate the comments to date from Monsieur Perrault, so I'm not asking him to comment on details of the case that was reported.

I do think we're in a moment where those allegations have been made in the media. The issue has been raised in the House. On the weekend, the Prime Minister offered up that he hadn't been briefed on these 11 candidates. From a public confidence point of view, I think that probably would have been helpful sooner in the process.

Monsieur Perrault does have experience talking about elections and inducing confidence in the electoral process. I think there is clearly a tension here in the mind of the public between these allegations that have surfaced, the Prime Minister later saying he didn't know anything about it and people asking questions.

For Canadians who want to come out of this feeling confident about the process and who are not satisfied to date with the way things have transpired, what do you think government, Elections Canada or other players in this process could do to help those Canadians who say that, fundamentally, they want to have confidence in the process? They think it's probably okay, but they have some lingering questions down in the backs of their minds.

Is there a process that you think might help? I get that it's not your job to determine when an investigation is warranted. That's the commissioner's job. Suggestions have been made in the House about maybe having the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians look at this.

Is there some other organization or group that could engage in a process that you think might help shore up Canadians' confidence with respect to this particular allegation?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I understand, Madam Chair, that the committee will be hearing from CSIS. They may have things to share with the committee in terms of the process of that nature. I can't speak for them. Again, I think it's important for accountabilities to be quite distinct. As much as I value the independence of Elections Canada, it goes both ways.

To reassure Canadians, what I can say is this: Prior to the 2019 election, and certainly prior to 2021, but in both cases, there was a high level of alertness to this issue amongst the various institutions that have a role to play. Not only were they alert, but they were very deliberate in sharing their concerns with political participants—parties—through briefings. We had them come to the advisory committee of political parties in February 2019 prior to the election and I know there were subsequent ongoing briefings to the parties. The system was geared up to deal with those issues.

Beyond that, I can't say what actually took place and who shared information. That is beyond my mandate, but the system was geared up for this. I would say that the eyes were on the ball.

Mr. Daniel Blaikie: In respect of one proposal that's been made in the House, which is to just make the names of these 11 candidates public, do you have any advice either for the committee or for government about the potential consequences of doing that without any other due process around that? Are there any consequences, either positive or negative, that we should be aware of?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think it's always important to reinforce the need for the rule of law. Unlike other countries, we have a democracy that is based on the rule of law and we need to let that process flow, and that means having investigations that are confidential. If they do warrant prosecution, prosecutions are made in a court process. Certainly, we need to have confidence that the institutions we have set up to operate under the rule of law are doing their job, but we should not substitute ourselves for the various institutions.

It's important to raise awareness of this issue, and I think the work of this committee is assisting in raising awareness, but we also have to let the rules operate as they should.

Mr. Daniel Blaikie: The report you issued on the 43rd and 44th general elections—I believe that was in June, but you can correct me if I'm wrong about that—is called “Meeting New Challenges: Recommendations from the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada following the 43rd and 44th General Elections”. I think there is one specific reference to foreign interference in section 4.2, “Broadening the Scope of Existing Prohibitions”.

Could you elaborate on that particular section of your report for the committee and speak specifically about what you believe undertaking what you recommend would do to help prevent foreign interference in Canadian elections?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, this was a provision that was enacted in 2019 and that applies extraterritorially. It targets a range of measures that are designated under the Canada Elections Act as exerting undue influence.

This provision, unlike other provisions, applies only during the election period. Of course, I do believe that it needs to be extended beyond that. In my recommendations report, I recommend that at the very least it go through the regulated pre-writ period, but the committee may also consider, in fact, expanding it at all times.

This is one recommendation that is specifically on foreign interference. As I said in my prior appearance, foreign interference is conducted in a range of ways, so there are specific aspects of the legislation that are useful although they do not pertain specifically to foreign interference. Whether it's disinformation or impersonation of candidates, that is an illustration.

The Chair: Thank you.

I wanted you to be able to complete your thought, but I can't be too lenient.

With that, I appreciate it. [Translation]

Mr. Berthold, the floor is yours for five minutes.

Mr. Luc Berthold (Mégantic—L'Érable, CPC): Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Mr. Perrault, thank you very much for being with us today. We are here because a Global News article revealed that a foreign underground network allegedly funded 11 candidates' election campaigns, which may have affected the outcome of some elections.

The Chief Electoral Officer is appointed directly by the Parliament. Therefore, you are the representative appointed by Canadians and elected officials to ensure that elections are well-run in Canada. I have reviewed your mandate, part of which is to “monitor compliance with electoral legislation”. In addition, your values include “continuously earning and maintaining the public's trust”.

What does it take for the Chief Electoral Officer, who is responsible for the electoral process in Canada, to come to the conclusion that an election was influenced by foreign interference?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: It certainly takes more than a newspaper article. Again, I have a lot of respect for journalists, but I can't rely on a newspaper article.

By the way, the issue involved many implications, but none of that was confirmed by this article. First, it is not clear whether the money was used for the candidates' campaigns. The article does not say so. Even if you believe the article, you don't know whom the money went to or what it was used for. Essentially, we're talking about what I would call attempts at bribery or buying influence. Those are not necessarily attempts to influence the election.

Mr. Luc Berthold: Let's set aside that article.

The Chief Electoral Officer must, at some point, report and certify the result of the election by stating that it was conducted properly and that there was no foreign influence.

At what point will the Chief Electoral Officer say he has concerns? How many ridings must be targeted, how many allegations and investigations must there be before the Chief Electoral Officer says that he has concerns and that there is a possibility that the outcome of some elections may have been influenced by foreign interference activities?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: After each election, I submit a report to Parliament, which is discussed in this committee. If I have any concerns about the fairness of the election, I will never hesitate to report them. If you read my report on the last election, you will see that I was very transparent about what worked well and what didn't. At that time, there was no specific indication to me that there was foreign interference, and this is still the case. I was aware of the risks, however, and my job is to work with the parties and with national security agency partners to make participants aware of the risks.

The mechanics of the act are followed: I report to the committee and convey, in a very transparent way, any concerns I may have about the conduct of the election, without necessarily putting a label on what's going on in one, 11, or three ridings.

Mr. Luc Berthold: That's my point.

I'm submitting a hypothesis to you, as I really want to know how this works. If you ever found out that there had been foreign interference, which affected the outcome of a campaign in a constituency, would you say that it affected the outcome of the election?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That is a good question.

It is extremely difficult to establish a causal relationship between financial irregularities and the outcome of the election. It's difficult even when it comes to spending. Campaign spending sometimes exceeds the set limit. Yet, it is extremely difficult to draw a conclusion on how overspending may have impacted the results in a particular riding.

There is, however, a mechanism for this: contesting the election. If someone believes that the election results were influenced, there is a mechanism for deciding on the issue.

Mr. Luc Berthold: So when it is publicly stated that there was no foreign influence on the results of the 2019 and 2021 elections, that is a general statement. Based on the information you have, we can't confirm anything; we can't say there was no influence, but we also can't assume that the influence changed the results.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That's exactly right. I think talking about the impact on the results is very speculative. The article in question talks about contributions made to candidates. To me, it's much less about the possibility that it changed the outcome of an election than it is about the fact that people's loyalty was bought.

Mr. Luc Berthold: It could go either way.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Indeed, what the article says is that it could go either way.

Mr. Luc Berthold: I'm not necessarily talking about the article, but more in general terms.

I see my time is now up. It is a shame, because we were on to something interesting.

The Chair: Would you like to finish what you started to say, Mr. Berthold?

Mr. Luc Berthold: What I want to know is at what point you can say that something happened in a constituency, so that the overall outcome of the election was influenced by a foreign power. At what point does the Chief Electoral Officer consider that he has received enough information, complaints and contestations to say that there was foreign influence, even if it did not change the result of the vote? What does it take for the Chief Electoral Officer to come to such conclusions in his report to Parliament? Let's not forget that, as Chief Electoral Officer, you are the voice of the public.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That's an important question, but it is not my role to say whether or not the election in a particular riding is valid. My role is to report to the committee what I know about the conduct of the election. If a voter believes that the results have been influenced, the mechanism for contesting the results of an election is to go to court. Only a court has the authority to overturn an election. It is not the role of the Chief Electoral Officer to say that. My role is to convey to Canadians, through this committee, what happened in an election, what went right and what went wrong.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Ms. Sahota, you have the floor.

[English]

Ms. Ruby Sahota (Brampton North, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Chief Electoral Officer, for your presence here today.

My first question is regarding the recommendations you were just talking about. Through many Parliaments, you've been coming before this committee and making recommendations after an election. You made recent recommendations about foreign interference and financing rules that should be changed.

Were these recommendations made from a precautionary perspective, or were they based on some examples that you can give this committee of things you've learned through your partner agencies?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: There's a long list of recommendations, so it's difficult to provide a blanket answer. For example, as we go through applying the law, we sometimes find that it is inadequate to deal with certain circumstances.

Here we're talking about contributions. In my recommendations report, I made some recommendations to better ensure the transparency of the source of money. Right now there are rules against cash contributions that are more than $20. It's not allowed. However, there are no rules against prepaid credit cards. That was a matter of debate during a recent leadership race. I took well note of that and I agreed, in my mind, that this needs to be addressed.

Also, in my report we talk about cryptocurrencies. We haven't seen any use of cryptocurrencies to fund elections in Canada, but they are used to a growing extent in the United States. What are the rules that apply? We have guidance on that, based on the existing rules, but I do not feel that the existing rules provide sufficient transparency for those contributions.

There are things that we are looking at, and that I'm looking at, in this recommendations report that are not specifically about foreign interference, but that may be of assistance in addressing issues of foreign interference, in that case, through contributions.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: Thank you for that.

There's a saying that I'm fond of, that only a fool learns from their own mistakes. It's good to see that you are looking to other jurisdictions and other countries and learning from them, so we do not step into something that could be problematic.

You mentioned that Canadians should have confidence in their institutions. You are one of our finest institutions. I was wondering if you could elaborate on how Elections Canada can communicate to Canadians and continue their confidence in your institution.

I know many questions have been raised about what the threshold is. What would you do if there was an incident? The commissioner would investigate. What would that look like? You said that the investigation could be made public, but it might be private. Could you walk us through a bit of that so Canadians can have that confidence?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think an important role of Elections Canada is explaining the rules and the process. That's something that we take to heart. In the last election, for example, there were concerns about mail-in voting in light of the American experience. We were very deliberate in explaining every step of the controls and making sure that we were quite transparent and that Canadians could see what controls were in place.

Of course, we don't reach everybody. Not everybody looks at our website, but we have media and other partners to facilitate conversations about the security of our elections.

When anybody has specific information regarding non-compliance with the act, they should not hesitate to contact either my office or the commissioner. If it's my office, I will pass it on to the commissioner. Her mandate is to examine whether, in her judgment, this warrants a review or an investigation and to take appropriate steps to follow through on that. That may lead to a range of penalties, going from administrative monetary penalties all the way to criminal prosecutions. When those penalties are applied or the prosecutions take place, it is public.

That provides a degree of transparency at the end of the day on what took place during an election.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: You referenced earlier that we should be very careful about what is said or spoken about in the media or in Parliament, even.

Why is it that you say that? What is your fear about some of these articles that are being published?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I want to be prudent to not draw conclusions from information that is not demonstrated. Again, I want to show no disrespect in any way to the media outlets and the journalists, but in my capacity, and, certainly, other institutions that are involved in securing the election, we can't draw conclusions from just news reports.

Ms. Ruby Sahota: What would happen if we were to draw those conclusions?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: We would risk discrediting the electoral process in situations that are not warranted. However, even in this case, even if we accept at face value what is said, we don't know which are the districts, what are the amounts of money and whether they went to the campaigns or to the pockets of the candidates.

Is this a corruption of individuals, or is it an attempt to support a campaign? We don't know any of that, so it's premature. Even if we accept those as facts, it's premature to draw conclusions. There are not enough facts at this point.

The Chair: Thank you. [Translation]

Ms. Gaudreau, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm going to put all my thoughts together. We were discussing increased transparency and legislation to enhance our capacity to target any possible attempts at corruption and influence. My understanding is that there are a lot of things to consider when we get the opportunity to ask the commissioner some questions.

At the moment, it's difficult to really be sure about anything, because we can't prove anything. An investigation is needed and it's complicated. I may be wrong, but in addition to being much more vigilant, haven't we got to the point of having to look at the situation under the Lobbying Act and the Conflict of Interest Act? We've come a long way.

Voters, for whatever party they may support, as we were saying this morning, want to have more confidence in the system. I'd like you to reassure me on that score. Have you any suggestions to make? We could begin by reviewing Canada's privacy rules, which are clearly inadequate. Only yesterday, I was with the president of Estonia. We could learn from Estonia on that score.

What would you suggest? If you run out of time, I'd like to receive a report from you about this.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I would like us to pay attention to it here. I make recommendations about the Canada Elections Act, and I'm going to continue to do so. With support for these recommendations we can then amend the act.

Some measures could indeed go farther. I'll give you an example. I'm talking about potentially illegal contributions. Normally, every candidate submits a report that includes a list of their contributors, and everything is reviewed by my office; so how can such contributions be made? If that kind of money is coming in, it means that it's either cash, which is illegal beyond a certain amount, and if so it would require an investigation, or through prepaid credit cards, which I have recommended be eliminated, or through fake identities, a well-known problem.

Quebec has in fact adopted rules that are more strict than at the federal level. Employer names are requested so that several contributions from a given employer can be identified. That's not mentioned in my recommendations report, but the committee members may be interested in that. And don't think that I'm assuming the employer in this instance is the Embassy of China. The bottom line is that there are ways of improving the system.

Allow me to repeat that my role is to talk about the Canada Elections Act, and not other regimes that may be relevant with respect to instances of corruption.

Ms. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Gaudreau.

Mr. Blaikie, please go ahead.

Mr. Daniel Blaikie: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Perrault has already dealt with the issues I was going to ask about. I will therefore ask him to simply continue to talk to us about the recommendations made in section 4.2 of his June report. If there are other ways to come up with legislation that would reduce the possibility of election interference, I'd like him to tell us about them.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: My report contains another recommendation about the transparency of third-party funding which includes the issue of third-party foreign funding. We discussed this the last time I appeared before the committee.

Currently, third parties can neither receive nor use foreign contributions. It's important to note that a third party is any individual or group that is not a candidate or a political party. Third parties have a life outside of elections and have sources of income that can be commercial or consist of contributions received for general purposes to serve the causes they defend. So if third parties decide to get involved in an election, the funds they use are considered under the act to be their own, even when they come from abroad originally. That raises an issue of transparency and possibly of foreign financing.

What I recommend is that the possibility of requiring groups that receive a certain threshold of funding in the form of contributions to be limited, for the purposes of activities regulated by the Canada Elections Act, to using contributions from a bank account containing donations only from eligible Canadian donors under the act. Groups that do not receive contributions and have commercial revenue, can continue to use their own revenue.

This is an option I suggested to the committee to deal with the issue of third-party funding, including potential foreign funding.

Mr. Daniel Blaikie: Thank you very much, Mr. Perrault.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Blaikie. Mr. Nater, you have the floor.

[English]

Mr. John Nater (Perth—Wellington, CPC): Thank you, Madam Chair.

I get Mr. Blaikie's extra time as well.

Mr. Perrault, I want to start off by asking a follow-up question.

When you are made aware during a writ period of information of wrongdoing or potential wrongdoing, at what point would you think it's sufficient enough to make the public aware of the threat of foreign interference during a writ period?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: That is, Madam Chair, I think, a highly theoretical question in the sense that, typically, financial violations do not come to light during an election period. I've never seen a situation where that occurred. Again, we have a system guided by the rule of law. If I believe I have evidence that there was an illegal contribution or any violation of the act, my role is to refer that to the commissioner. Until the commissioner completes her investigation, I think it's premature for me to speak to any particular violation.

Mr. John Nater: Thank you for that.

In going back to your opening comments, you flagged, as you have in the past, concerns that were raised prior to the 2019 election about the risks of foreign interference. That was your first election as Chief Electoral Officer, but you had been involved with the organization for a number of years prior to that. I'm curious about what changed between 2015 and 2019, from your perspective, that flagged that risk more clearly for 2019 versus previous elections.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: The answer is that it was very clear after the 2016 presidential election in the U.S. After that election, I believe in January or February, I did meet with the Privy Council Office. I did reach out to the Communications Security Establishment to start preparing for our election, because I realized that things had changed.

The concerns we had in the past around disruptions to the elections were more about natural disasters or policing matters, but then they were of a different nature.

I think I was not the only one to draw that conclusion. We saw a number of actions taken by the panel that was put in place. Different players reacted to that, but I think that was very clearly the starting point.

Mr. John Nater: Now, with the benefit of 2019 and 2021 and looking forward to the 2020-something election, where do you see the biggest risk from foreign actors? Going forward, where do you see the biggest risk?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think that's a very good question for CSIS. I take my information in that regard from CSIS, and we will continue to meet.

So far, what we know on our side is very much what was said in the public report of CSIS prior to the 2021 election. It may evolve over time. I have no reason to doubt that we'll keep sharing information as we prepare for the election.

Mr. John Nater: Thank you, Mr. Perrault.

Madam Chair, I'll turn it over to Mr. Cooper.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Perrault, through you, Madam Chair, I know you cannot speak to the contents of the Global News report, but I'll put to you a hypothetical based on that report.

If there were $250,000 that were directed by a foreign consulate through proxies and then funnelled into campaigns of federal candidates, first of all, would you agree that it would violate multiple sections of the Canada Elections Act?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Absolutely.

Mr. Michael Cooper: Among the sections in that hypothetical that could be violated would be section 363 prohibiting foreign money to candidates; section 367 pertaining to the maximum con‐tribution limit of $1,500 per person; section 368 prohibiting any person or entity from circumventing or attempting to circumvent the prohibition of foreign money and the maximum contribution limit as well as concealing or attempting to conceal the identity of the source of a contribution or acting in collusion with another person or entity for that purpose; and section 370, which prohibits indirect contributions where the source of money comes from another person or entity.

Would you agree that all of those sections could be implemented?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: On the face of it, under your hypothetical, yes.

Mr. Michael Cooper: We often hear the assertion that the overall election was free and fair. Just because the overall election is free and fair, I would ask if you could clarify that it doesn't negate the possibility there could be interference or could be instances of illegal activity. There could be instances of violations of the Canada Elections Act that would not impact the overall integrity of an election. Do you concur?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Madam Chair, in every election there are signs that are unfortunately destroyed. There are all kinds of irregularities that take place, but that does not negate the overall fairness of the election. It doesn't mean that these behaviours are right or that they're fair, but there's quite a difference between seeing illegal behaviour and drawing inferences regarding the results of the election.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Fergus, you have five minutes.

[Translation]

Hon. Greg Fergus (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.): Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'd also like to thank Mr. Perrault for his presentation.

Mr. Perrault, you are the fourth chief electoral officer that I have had the privilege of meeting in my lifetime, after Mr. Hamel, Mr. Kingsley and Mr. Mayrand. We have a fine and long-standing tradition in Canada.

I would just like to confirm that you believe Canada has some of the best mechanisms and regulations in the world for the proper conduct of elections.

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: I think, generally speaking, that Canada has an excellent regime.

One of the things that makes it excellent is that it is reviewed on a regular basis. Not only that, but this committee plays an important role. After every election, the chief electoral officer prepares reports, learns lessons from the election and makes recommendations about changes to the act. My predecessors did so, as I have in turn. These recommendations are then very seriously examined by the committee. There is a solid tradition of conducting these examinations in a non-partisan manner. The fact that we strive to improve the electoral process in a non-partisan manner contributes enormously to the credibility of the Canadian regime.

Hon. Greg Fergus: I would imagine that if we had to start over from scratch, you too would establish a federal elections commis ioner position and a chief electoral officer position, to ensure that irreproachable and non-partisan people organize elections in Canada; is that right?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: One of the features that makes our system so solid is that we have an elections administration that is independent from the government, and headed by a chief electoral officer appointed by the House of Commons. This is not something you see everywhere around the world and it's an important aspect.

Hon. Greg Fergus: Yesterday evening, when I read the notes you provided, I saw that you did not want to take a position on this question today because you did not have all the facts and could not could not draw conclusions based on a Global News report. Why is that?

[English]

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Process matters. [Translation]

That's simply all I would say about it.

It's important to follow the procedures in place. We're talking here about potentially very serious violations of the act that would be very damaging to elections. We therefore need to take the time to ensure that the evidence is known and reviewed, and that the process is followed. This includes ensuring the independence of the commissioner, who would conduct her investigations with all of the tools available to her, without any interference. You have to look carefully before drawing conclusions.

Hon. Greg Fergus: They are nevertheless serious allegations, and I take what's in the report seriously, as do all other parliamentarians, I believe. I would even go so far as to say that the vast majority of people who actually actually put their name on a ballot take it seriously, whether or not they have a good chance of winning in their riding. Is that your point of view also?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: Definitely. When candidates decide to run, something that you've done several times, we send them a letter reminding them of the importance of complying with the act. We send them a message about maintaining the reputation of candi‐dates and the electoral process. They are also reminded that if they have any concerns or see anything that doesn't appear to be consistent with the act, they should report it to Elections Canada or to the office of the commissioner of Canada Elections. All participants have a role to play and I don't have the impression that our system is corrupt.

Hon. Greg Fergus: What message can you send out to ordinary people listening to us talk about the Global News report? Do you take it seriously. Does the commissioner of Canada Elections take it seriously? Are you looking into the allegations made in this report?

Mr. Stéphane Perrault: All the participants are taking it seriously. I have no reason to doubt it. As I said in my opening address, the national security organizations we have been talking about were very much aware of issues of this kind prior to the election. They kept us informed accordingly, and we in turn transmitted relevant information to the political parties. The then commissioner also took the matter seriously. The current commissioner even wrote to the committee, and I think she stated very clearly that she took it seriously.

The message people need to receive is that we have institutions that are working properly and that we need to let them do their work.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Fergus. [English]

On behalf of PROC committee members, I would like to thank you, Mr. Perrault, for your time today and for the discourse and information you've shared.

As always, should you wish to share any information, including what was referenced earlier on the list, please do send it to the clerk and we'll have it circulated to committee members.

With that, I wish you and your team a good day. Keep up the good work.

Thank you. Have a good day, everyone.

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Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force (SITE)

Supplementary Messages

Supporting Facts and Figures

Background

As a member of the SITE Task Force, RRM Canada leverages its G7 RRM network to share international lessons learned and assessments to inform SITE practice; as well as serves as an early warning system by producing open-source data analytics on foreign threats to democracy, with a focus on disinformation tactics.

During General Election 43 (GE43), RRM Canada organized training on foreign interference for relevant departments and agencies; contributed to threat briefings for senior officials, political parties and the media; as well as produced daily reporting for the Panel of Five (P5). It also contracted Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research Lab to report on foreign disinformation.

Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM)

Supplementary Messages

Supporting Facts and Figures

Update

In March 2022, the Prime Minister announced additional funding for RRM Canada to continue leading the G7 RRM which was provided through Budget 2022. Additionally, in August 2022, the Prime Minister announced the creation of a dedicated Eastern Europe unit at RRM Canada to improve Canada’s efforts to understand, monitor, and detect Russian and other state-sponsored disinformation.

Key Definitions

Critical Election Incident Public Protocol (CEIPP)

Supplementary Messages

Update

An independent evaluation of the Protocol, its implementation and effectiveness in addressing threats, is required after every election. Through document review, interviews and research, a substantial review is completed and a classified report with findings and recommendations is presented to the Prime Minister and the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP). An unclassified version is later released publicly.

An independent evaluation of the 2021 federal election is currently underway by Mr. Morris Rosenberg, a former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Justice and Attorney General of Canada. An unclassified version of this report, including his findings and recommendations, is expected be submitted shortly.

Supporting Facts and Figures

Background

The Critical Election Incident Public Protocol is a mechanism for senior public servants (the Panel) to communicate clearly, transparently, and impartially with Canadians during an election in the event of an incident or incidents that threaten the integrity of a federal election. First implemented in 2019, the Protocol underwent an independent assessment following the 43rd General Election, and has been renewed and updated for future elections. The Critical Election Incident Public Protocol has a limited mandate. It is initiated to respond to incidents that occur during the caretaker period, and that do not fall within Elections Canada’s areas of responsibility.

The Protocol includes provisions for: informing candidates, organizations or election officials if they have been the known target of an attack; briefing the group of senior public servants at the heart of the Protocol; informing the Prime Minister and other party leaders (or their designates) that a public announcement is planned; and notifying the public.

The Protocol is comprised of the Clerk of the Privy Council; the National Security and Intelligence Advisor to the Prime Minister; the Deputy Minister of Justice and Deputy Attorney General; the Deputy Minister of Public Safety; and, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, who are responsible for jointly determining whether the threshold for informing Canadians has been met, whether through a single incident or an accumulation of incidents.

In advance of the 2021 General Election, the Panel began meeting in May 2021. In total the Panel convened four times prior to the beginning of the election period in August. The Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force (SITE) briefed the Panel on the threat environment. The Panel began working through scenarios to develop a common understanding of the threshold for intervention.

The 2021 election was called on August 15. From then until election day on September 20, the Panel held six weekly meetings. SITE would provide a briefing on any information and intelligence available to it at the time of each Panel meeting, and it was the Panel’s responsibility to determine whether the threshold was triggered, or whether there were other interventions required based on the intelligence provided. None of information presented in these briefings rose to the level of meeting the threshold.

Global Affairs Canada (GAC) Role in Responding to Foreign Interference

Supplementary Messages

Cyber diplomacy

Indo Pacific Cyber Initiative

Background

Along with other members of the security and intelligence community, including the Communications Security Establishment (CSE), the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the Department of National Defence (DND) and the Department of Public Safety (PS), GAC has been working actively to protect Canada against these behaviours by assessing and understanding foreign threats, while ensuring Canada’s foreign policy interests are considered as part of these initiatives. Key initiatives/lines of business include:

The threat posed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC), including malign activities targeting Canada’s democratic institutions, communities and economic prosperity (see Tabs 012 and 014) is of particular concern. China’s state-sponsored cyber program, reports of PRC-sponsored harassment and intimidation of human rights activists and members of the Chinese diaspora in Canada, and reports of illicit PRC “police stations” in the Greater Toronto Area are key examples. Disinformation from Russia is a growing concern in Canada and on a global scale (see Tab 013).

Disinformation – China

Supplementary Messages

Update

Background

Disinformation - Russia

Supplementary Messages

Update

Background

Russia’s disinformation and propaganda machine, including in the Ukraine context, employs five main tactics, according to a public report released by the State Department last year. Based on the report, the Kremlin:

  1. Uses official government communications, including statements and social media posts;
  2. Leverages state-funded media, such as RT or Sputnik TV;
  3. Cultivates proxy sources, including Russian-aligned outlets, or grey web sites, that produce content that is then amplified both wittingly and unwittingly;
  4. Weaponises social media by employing fake accounts or amplifying polarising discourses in Western societies to undermine trust and social cohesion; and,
  5. Uses cyber means to acquire or forge information and disrupt communication. Fake video addresses by President Zelensky and recent forged letters by Ukrainian and Polish officials come to mind.

Before drop of the writ, as part of regular practice, GAC notifies all foreign missions in Canada to respect the election period, and withhold views that affect bilateral relations. It is sent via email as a reminder of obligations under the Vienna Convention.

Allegations of Chinese Interference in GE43

Supplementary Messages

On connections to reports of PRC Police Stations in Canada:

Supporting Facts and Figures

Canada-China Bilateral Relations

Supplementary Messages

Update

Minister Joly had an informal meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the margins of the G20 Summit on November 15, 2022. Minister Joly raised the war in Ukraine, North Korea, COP15, and alleged Chinese foreign interference.

Minister Joly also met with FM Wang on July 8, 2022, on the margins of the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Indonesia. This was their first in-person interaction.

In late October, Ambassador Jennifer May arrived in Beijing as the new Canadian Ambassador to China.

Supporting Facts and Figures

Allegations of PRC “Police Stations” and Recent Diplomatic Engagement

Supplementary Messages

Background

Chinese “police stations”

Representations to the PRC Embassy - Chinese “police stations”

Foreign Interference – China

Background

Foreign interference (general)

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