Outside Influence 2
As Russian Influence Cruises on Autopilot, China Faces Scrutiny
With election day under four weeks’ away, disinformation is happily gaining profile as a topic. Disinfowatch published its first election report. The Canadian Digital Media Research Network launched its election monitoring and response, which includes a bilingual ‘digital threat tipline’, together with their first weekly update.
Under the ‘Online sabotage’ headline, Jill Mahoney of the Globe and Mail took an in-depth look at disinformation from abroad targeting Canada’s election. The Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) of the Atlantic Council also gave unprecedented attention to disinformation in Canada in a March 19 report entitled ‘An existential threat: Disinformation ‘single biggest risk’ to Canadian democracy.
Such attention, scrutiny and vigilance are welcome. What’s happening in the race?
What the Bots Are Saying
A large sample of Twitter/X accounts accessed and assessed today indicates the platform’s algorithms, hostile foreign-directed networks and motivated proxies have dialled back their hostility to both leading candidates. That said, the Carney campaign is garnering remarkably uniform positive coverage on X: out of over fifty active accounts analyzed, only two were dissenters, with all the rest supportive. (A similar result was found using multiple accounts, to reduce algorithm bias.)
The same broadly positive trend holds for Poilievre’s campaign, with one important difference: one-fifth of today’s comments were negative. These accounts often seek to associate Poilievre with Trump or MAGA, but did not show obvious signs or markers indicating inauthentic or foreign-directed activity.
What does this broadly positive, slightly pro-Carney online climate mean? Musk has aligned X algorithms with the goals of Moscow’s information warfare. Those coordinating Russian active measures are, for now at least, content to see Canada embroiled in a trade war with its closest ally. Moscow is no doubt also satisfied to note national defence and support for Ukraine have had little profile and assess Craney to be, as most informed analysts do, less likely to build pipelines.
US Dimension
US influencers and networks have also been remarkably silent on Canada. Apart from occasional bursts of sympathy from US celebrities or voices in border towns or states, the only major US outlet weighing in on Canada’s elections has been a grey zone one featuring Maxime Bernier several times last month:
The support of Alex Jones and his ilk for Bernier takes another page from Moscow’s playbook, which has long sought to discredit or radicalize centrist G7 parties by backing right-wing populists to undermine the centre-right. They did this in France with Le Pen; in Italy with the Five Star Movement, the League and Forza Italia; in the UK with Farage, Brexit and Reform; in the US, with Trump and the Republican Party. (Their attempt with the AfD in Germany has so far failed.) In Canada, the main Russia-backed strategies for radicalizing and weakening the Conservative Party of Canada have been Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada, formed in 2018, and the 2022 truckers’ blockade, which was heavily amplified by Russian media and online.
Foreign-backed Proxies
India has been in the spotlight due to the removal of Liberal Chandra Arya as a candidate, as well as allegations of Indian influence over the last Conservative leadership race. (The timing of the latter charges was questionable, to put it mildly.) The reality is that many states, including India, Iran, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, seek to influence candidate nomination races in Canada, prompting both major Canadian party headquarters to appoint more candidates this year – rather than risk messy nomination races giving scope to interference and skulduggery.
No foreign state has been as energetic in advancing preferred candidates as China. Liberal candidate Paul Chiang’s belated resignation after he had effectively endorsed China’s threats of transnational thuggery against the Conservative candidate, a Hong Kong democracy activist, should remind us of the interconnected coterie of current and former Liberal politicians in Scarborough and Markham with uncomfortably close ties to Beijing. Despite holding a public enquiry and continuing public debate, Canada does not yet have effective safeguards against such mischief.