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Results: 1 - 15 of 16
View Joël Lightbound Profile
Lib. (QC)
Have you seen an acceleration as a result of the pandemic? I think that this was noted in your report.
People are spending more time online, and there are more conspiracy theories, for example.
Has this affected radicalization and the rate?
View David McGuinty Profile
Lib. (ON)
For each of the five topics that we covered in the report, we tried to provide, at the end of a chapter, an analysis of what has happened since the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact on the five areas.
In that analysis, we know there has been a decrease in mass gatherings. We know there has been a closure of public spaces and limits on travel. These things may have had a bearing on driving activity further online.
This is something the RCMP is examining. They believe it could result in people looking for advice or information over the Internet and accessing what we call extremist echo chambers. We believe that COVID-19, more social isolation and more financial hardship during the restrictions have likely put more of this type of IMVE and incel activity online.
View Bill Blair Profile
Lib. (ON)
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'll accept your remarks with respect to charm, but I'm afraid, with respect to looks, it's contrary to the evidence before us.
I'd like to thank the committee for the invitation today, and I'm pleased to present the 2021 supplementary estimates (C) and the 2021-22 main estimates for the public safety portfolio.
I'm very ably joined today by a number of my colleagues. Respectfully, in the interest of time, I will not introduce them, but I'd like to take the opportunity to acknowledge that, during these incredibly difficult and challenging times over the past year, they've all stepped up to the plate. They've been working diligently to keep our borders, communities and correctional institutions safe as well as to protect our national security.
Today, Mr. Chair, I believe these estimates reflect that work.
I'll go through the supplementary estimates (C) for 2021 in order to present these items chronologically. The approval of these estimates will result in funding approvals of $11.1 billion for the public safety portfolio, and that represents an increase of 3.3% over total authorities provided to date. I will briefly share some of the highlights here as they relate to how we manage our critical services during the pandemic.
The first is $135.8 million for the Correctional Service of Canada for critical operating requirements related to COVID-19.
The second is $35 million for Public Safety Canada, to support the urgent relief efforts of the Canadian Red Cross during the pandemic. Mr. Chair, as you know, the many volunteers and staff of the Canadian Red Cross have been there to support Canadians from the outset of this pandemic, including at long-term care homes right across the country.
I would ask this committee to join me in thanking them for all their service and for providing help where it was needed most. I’ll also note that this funding is in addition to the $35 million of vote 5 funding to Public Safety from Health Canada to support rapid response capacity testing being deployed to fill gaps in surge and targeted activities, including remote and isolated communities.
Included in these supplementary estimates is funding to enhance the integrity of our borders and asylum system while also modernizing the agency’s security screening system. This funding will ensure that security screening results are made available at the earliest opportunity under a reformed system.
I'd like to take this opportunity to highlight that CBSA employees have done a remarkable job in keeping our borders safe in response to COVID-19. I'd like to take the opportunity as well to thank them for their continued hard work in keeping Canadians safe.
We're also working through these supplementary estimates to increase funding to end violence against indigenous women and girls and to provide essential mental health services.
For the RCMP, we are investing significant funds through both the supplementary and main estimates to support improvements to the federal policing investigative capacity by bolstering its capability with additional policing professionals, investigators and scientists. This will be used to deal with federal policing initiatives, which include responding to money laundering, cybercrime such as child sexual exploitation, and national security such as responding to terrorism and foreign-influenced hostile activities.
Mr. Chair, if I may, I'll turn to the 2021-22 main estimates. The public safety portfolio, as a whole, is requesting a total of approximately $10 billion for this fiscal year. As I’ve previously noted, the portfolio funding has remained stable over the last few years. I will endeavour to break down the numbers by organization.
Public Safety Canada is seeking a total of $1.1 billion in the main estimates. This represents an increase of $329.9 million, or 45.5%, over the previous year. The bulk of this increase is due to the grants and contributions regarding the disaster financial assistance arrangements program, or DFAA. It’s an increase in funding based upon forecasts from provinces and territories for expected disbursements under the DFAA for this fiscal year. This represents a critical part of my portfolio as minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.
In these main estimates, increases also include $15 million for incremental funding to take action against gun and gang violence. As this committee knows, I introduced Bill C-21 in the House not very long ago, a bill designed to protect Canadians from firearm violence and to fulfill our promise of strengthening gun control.
Mr. Chair, I know that this committee will have the chance to review that legislation at some future date, and I look forward to discussing it with them at that time.
I want to focus on a number of ongoing issues and our responses to them, starting with Correctional Service of Canada, which is seeking $2.8 billion this fiscal year, which represents an increase of $239.8 million or 9.4% over the previous year. This net increase is primarily due to a net increase in operating funding, which includes an increase for transforming federal corrections as a result of the passage of the former Bill C-83, which introduced the new structured intervention unit model.
That bill represents a major change in the way our correctional institutions operate, and recent reports have been clear that more work must be done. Funding is just one part of the solution. With the creation of data teams, efforts to replicate best practices nationally and enhanced support from independent, external decision-makers, I am confident we will deliver on this transformational promise.
I want to again acknowledge the troubling findings that were made in the Bastarache report, which I know this committee has examined and reviewed with concern. We are seeking funds to establish the independent centre for harassment resolution. This will be responsible for implementing the full resolution process, including conflict management, investigations and decision-making.
Mr. Chair, we know more work needs to be done. I'd like to conclude by noting the importance of our oversight agencies. You will see in the main estimates that we are seeking to increase funding for the Office of the Correctional Investigator, the CRCC and the ERC, the latter by close to 100%.
With that, Mr. Chair, I thank you and the members of the committee for your patience as I delivered my opening remarks. I'm happy to answer questions that members may have about these estimates and the collective work of our portfolio.
Scott Jones
View Scott Jones Profile
Scott Jones
2020-12-09 15:32
Thank you very much for that, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon, committee members.
Thank you for the invitation to appear today to discuss cybersecurity and specifically the “National Cyber Threat Assessment 2020” report released on November 18.
As the head of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security at the Communications Security Establishment, I am very pleased to be here. CSE is Canada's foreign intelligence agency and lead technical and operational agency for cybersecurity. As was mentioned, I have appeared here a few times before.
Created in 2018, the cyber centre is a unified source of expert advice, guidance and support on cybersecurity operational matters. We work closely with other government agencies, industry partners and the public to improve cybersecurity for Canadians and to make Canada more resilient against cyber-threats.
Our goal with the national cyber-threat assessment is not to frighten Canadians or to be downers, but rather to inform all of us about the threats we will be facing in the coming years. I hope it spurs many of us to take simple actions to protect ourselves. We have seen that easy, simple actions can greatly increase our individual security.
Canada is one of the most connected countries in the world, which the NCTA highlights, and the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated our reliance on the Internet to meet basic needs. We are increasingly leading our lives online, and at the same time threat actors continue to pursue new ways to use the Internet for malicious purposes. While this assessment does not provide specific mitigation advice, more guidance and best practices can be found on the cyber centre's website and through our “Get Cyber Safe” public awareness campaign. As I've said before, by taking even a single action, all Canadians can help shape and sustain our nation's cyber-resilience.
For those Canadians who would like to learn more, we have also published an updated “An Introduction to the Cyber Threat Environment”, which I will confess I may slip and call the “cyber primer”, in which we explain many of the terms and techniques used in cybersecurity.
The assessment analyzes cyber-trends since 2018 and draws upon the cyber centre's unique view of the cyber-threat environment to forecast those trends to around 2022. The assessment also highlights the most relevant cyber-threats to Canadian individuals and organizations.
Before I discuss those threats further, though, I would note that the assessment's findings are based on reporting from multiple classified and unclassified sources, including those related to CSE's foreign intelligence mandate. While the cyber centre must protect classified sources and methods, we have tried to provide readers with as much information as possible, including footnotes.
I'll now provide a brief breakdown of the cyber centre's key findings regarding the cyber-threat landscape. Broadly, these can be grouped into three key observations for our discussion today.
The NCTA 2020 highlights several key observations.
First, cybercrime is the threat most likely to impact Canadians now and in the years ahead, and cybercriminals often succeed because they exploit human and social behaviours.
Second, ransomware directed against Canada will almost certainly continue to target large enterprises and critical infrastructure providers.
Finally, while cybercrime is the main threat, state-sponsored cyber-programs of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran pose a strategic threat to Canada.
First, we assessed that cybercrime remains the threat most likely to impact Canadians. Now and in the years ahead Canadian individuals and organizations will continue to face online fraud and attempts to steal personal, financial and corporate information. Cybercriminals often succeed because they exploit deeply rooted human behaviours and social patterns as well as technological vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, as a result of this reality, Canadians are more at risk for cybercrime than ever. This has only increased during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Malicious cyber-actors are able to take advantage of people's heightened levels of fear to lure and encourage victims to visit fake websites, open email attachments and click on links that contain malware. These website emails and links frequently impersonate health organizations or the Government of Canada. Defending Canadians against these threats requires addressing both the technical and social elements of cyber-threat activity.
Second, the ongoing safety of Canadians depends on critical infrastructure as well as consumer and medical goods, many of which are increasingly being connected to the Internet by their manufacturers. However, once connected, these infrastructures and goods are susceptible to cyber-threats, and maintaining their security requires investments over time from manufacturers and owners that can be difficult to sustain.
We have assessed that ransomware directed at Canada will continue to target those large enterprises and critical infrastructure providers. As these entities cannot tolerate sustained disruptions, they are often willing to pay up to millions of dollars to quickly restore their operations. Many Canadian victims will likely continue to give in to ransom demands due to the severe costs of losing business and rebuilding their networks and the potential consequences of refusing payment. The protection of these organizations and networks is crucial to the productivity and competitiveness of Canadian companies, and vital for Canada's national defence.
Finally, state-sponsored actors are very likely attempting to develop cyber-capabilities to disrupt Canadian critical infrastructure to further their goals. However, we judge that it is very unlikely that cyber-threat actors will intentionally seek to disrupt critical infrastructure and cause major damage or loss of life in the absence of international hostilities. Nevertheless, cyber-threat actors may target Canadian critical organizations to collect information, pre-position for future activities, or as a form of intimidation.
While cybercrime is the most likely threat to impact the average Canadian, state-sponsored cyber-programs of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran pose the greatest strategic threat to Canada. We have assessed that state-sponsored actors will almost certainly continue to attempt to steal Canadian intellectual property, proprietary information and, in today's context, information specifically related to COVID-19.
We have also assessed that online foreign influence campaigns are no longer limited to key political events such as election periods. They are now the new normal. Adversaries now look to sustain their influence campaigns across all levels of discourse deemed to be of strategic value. While Canadians are often lower-priority targets for online foreign influence activity, our media ecosystem is closely intertwined with that of the United States and other allies, which means that when their populations are targeted, Canadians become exposed to online influence as well.
I want to reassure you that CSE and the cyber centre are working hard to mitigate many of these threats and protect Canadians and their interests through targeted advice and guidance. CSE continues to leverage all aspects of its mandate to help ensure that Canada is protected against threats. Not only is the “National Cyber Threat Assessment” meant to inform Canadians, but it is also setting the priorities for action by the cyber centre on what actions we can take, often with partners in the private sector who are willing to stand up and assist in directly addressing these threats facing each of us.
A key example of this type of partnership is the Canadian Shield initiative from the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, CIRA. CIRA Canadian Shield is a free, protected DNS service that prevents you from connecting to malicious websites that might affect your device or steal your personal information. The service is provided by the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, a not-for-profit agency that manages the “.ca” Internet domain. The service uses threat intelligence from the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security. In simple terms, if someone who is using Canadian Shield clicks on a link that is known to be malicious, they will be stopped from going to that bad site.
CIRA has seen a number of Canadians pick up the use of this tool, although we would certainly like to see it accelerated more. We are just past the six-month mark. We do recommend that all Canadians take advantage of this free service built by Canadians for Canadians and designed to protect Canadians' privacy.
Through targeted advice and guidance, the cyber centre is helping to protect Canadians' cybersecurity interests. We are dedicated to advancing cybersecurity and increasing the confidence of Canadians in the systems they rely on. We hope this report will help raise the bar in terms of awareness of today's cyber-threats. I encourage Canadians who are looking for easy-to-follow tips on cybersecurity, such as our holiday gift guide, to visit our website, GetCyberSafe.gc.ca.
For businesses and large organizations, or if you would like to read more of the publications of the cyber centre, we can be found at cyber.gc.ca.
Thank you again for the opportunity to appear before you virtually today. I'll be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
CPC (AB)
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
2020-12-09 15:40
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you to the witness for being here and for your time, your report and all of your work. It's eye-opening and deeply alarming, so I think we're all glad that you're there.
In your comments and in your report you touched on the cost of foreign hacking to western companies and governments, even to the tune of individual Canadians losing over $43 million to cybercrime fraud in 2019, according to the statistics from the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.
Could you explain to us what costs the criminals and the foreign state-sponsored actors who engage in foreign interference in our democracy and society face? I wonder if you have any comments on whether or not they seem to act with relative impunity, without any serious risk of costs to their actions.
Scott Jones
View Scott Jones Profile
Scott Jones
2020-12-09 15:41
Thank you for the question, Mr. Chair, and your comments on the report.
I think there are a few things. If we look at cybercriminals, they very much reply upon an extremely developed ecosystem that relies on things like anonymous financial transactions—Bitcoin and the like. Having online digital currencies really does facilitate that.
In terms of the risk, it's certainly a question that I wish one of my colleagues from the RCMP were here to talk about in terms of prosecutions, but it remains a challenging environment in which you can achieve fraud against a Canadian from remote jurisdictions. As the report points out, there are many jurisdictions in which you will not suffer consequences from local authorities because as long as you don't target their citizens, they're not going to go after you. A bit of a quid pro quo seems to exist, and it certainly has been highlighted in some of the research.
In terms of some of the costs, we do try to impose costs. The government has done a number of attributions to call out state activity that we feel is crossing thresholds and crossing lines. Earlier this year we called out Russia for its activity against vaccine research companies. We have certainly joined our allies a number of times to do that. That was one instance in which we joined in with the United Kingdom and the United States to do that, specifically because it was targeting our areas, but we have, at some points, along with our allies, called out behaviour of each of the four nations I mentioned.
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
CPC (AB)
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
2020-12-09 15:43
Could you expand on the importance of attribution and exposing their intent? Also, do you have any other comments on possible other options to fight back, such as sanctions or other tools?
Scott Jones
View Scott Jones Profile
Scott Jones
2020-12-09 15:43
The value of attribution is pretty variable. The primary value of being a cyber defender and somebody who is worried about cybersecurity is that it spurs action. When we do an attribution, it tends to get organizations to take seriously the alerts we put out. When we say, “You need to apply this patch; it's important,” people will respond. When we say, “Apply this patch because country X is targeting this sector, ” they pay attention and they do it. It does have an effect domestically in getting the potential victims to take it seriously and to take action.
In terms of the international side, we certainly have not seen a significant change in the actors' behaviour because of it, but it does form norms. That is something that is probably more appropriate for my Global Affairs colleagues to talk about, and they're probably better positioned to talk about some of the things like sanctions and other aspects of foreign policy. I tend to try to stick to the technical and the cybersecurity elements.
View Angelo Iacono Profile
Lib. (QC)
Thank you.
For several years, we have been aware of the illegal activities and transactions that take place on the deep Web. For example, there is drug trafficking, prostitution, arms trafficking and even contract killings.
Can you tell us if we have been able to put in place means to reduce these worrisome activities and track the criminals in question?
Scott Jones
View Scott Jones Profile
Scott Jones
2020-12-09 16:35
I think that investigators at the RCMP, or perhaps at the Sûreté du Quebec, for example, might be in a better position to answer about the investigation phase.
One of the risks we see is that the dark web is certainly facilitating cybercriminals and cybercrime tools. There is an entire ecosystem out there where you can go on and say, “I want a tool that's going to allow me to do this.” Let's say you want to target this type of organization, or even a specific organization. They'll bid and tell you what it will cost. You can pay for 24-7 support or you can pay for a custom tool to be developed for you to achieve your goals.
Then there's the organized crime that goes behind all of that. It is a large enterprise out there. It's facilitated by the dark web and anonymous payment systems like Bitcoin and online currencies. One of the key challenges is that the entire system is designed to be anonymous and to not have attribution.
View Kamal Khera Profile
Lib. (ON)
Minister, my second question is about cybersecurity. We know that more Canadians are relying on information technology, which has made us more connected than ever before, but that also poses the question of vulnerabilities for hackers to exploit. We know that cybercrime has grown by more than 100% between 2014 and 2018, according to StatsCan.
In Brampton, my colleagues and I worked very closely with Ryerson University to fund the Cybersecure Catalyst, which is a national centre for cybersecurity in Brampton.
Minister, can you tell me exactly how our government is fighting cybercrime and keeping Canadians safe? Thank you.
View Bill Blair Profile
Lib. (ON)
We're investing $201 million to bolster Canada's ability to fight cybercrime. We're creating an RCMP national cybercrime coordination unit. Perhaps in the next session the commissioner will be able to provide you with more details.
View Kamal Khera Profile
Lib. (ON)
Thank you.
I want to go back to my earlier question on cybersecurity and cybercrime.
We know that cybercrime grew by more than 100% between 2014 to 2018, according to StatsCan. Can you elaborate a bit on what our government is doing or what investments we're making to fight cybercrime and keep Canadians safe?
Brenda Lucki
View Brenda Lucki Profile
Brenda Lucki
2020-02-27 10:03
Absolutely, thank you for that question.
As part of the strategy, there is approximately $201 million over five years and $43 million per year ongoing to bolster our ability to fight cybercrime. This includes the support of the creation of the RCMP national cybercrime coordination centre, which we refer to as NC3.
The mandate of NC3 is to coordinate Canadian cybercrime investigations and collaborate with international partners. It's also to provide digital investigative advice and guidance to Canadian police across the entire country, produce actionable cybercrime intelligence for Canadian police and establish a national public mechanism for Canadians and businesses to report cybercrime to police.
We established two additional cybercrime investigative teams, in Milton and in Montreal. In addition, there has been additional funding of $78.98 million over five years for the enforcement of cybercrime from the RCMP.
View Kamal Khera Profile
Lib. (ON)
You talked about the RCMP coordination centre. Where will that be located? Is it in Ottawa?
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