MPs agreed unanimously on May 9 to investigate China’s cyberattacks against parliamentarians through a House of Commons committee.
The cyberattack on Canadian parliamentarians was part of APT31’s broader hacking campaign against members of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), Mr. Genuis told the House of Commons on April 29. IPAC is an international group of cross-party legislators working to more effectively tackle the threat of Beijing.
“Canadian legislators should have been informed as soon as possible, especially given the progressive nature of this attack,” the MPs wrote. “Steps should be taken to ensure legislators are informed of attacks or potential attacks against them in the future, and to sanction those responsible for this attack.”
Targeting Personal Email
In an April 30 statement to The Epoch Times, Mathieu Gravel, spokesperson for the House of Commons Speaker’s Office, said the administration had “determined that the risk-mitigation measures in place had successfully prevented any attack,” adding that “There were no cybersecurity impacts to any Members or their communications.”“Parliamentarians still need to know about targeted threats against them, even when those threats do not succeed. If someone tries to hurt me but their attempts are thwarted, I would still like to know I have been targeted in order to plan to protect myself going forward,” he said in the House of Commons on May 1.
‘Chilling Effect’
During the May 9 House of Commons debate, several MPs among the 18 targeted by APT31 voiced their concerns about the broader impacts of the Chinese cyberattacks on Canadians.Conservative MP Tom Kmiec said these attacks on parliamentarians directly impact diaspora groups in Canada who have fled the Chinese regime.
“This has a chilling effect on the diaspora groups in Canada in their interactions with members of parliament. So it’s a direct impact on our parliamentary duties and our parliamentary privileges to ensure we can do this work on behalf of Canadians,” he said.
Fellow Tory MP James Bezan, the party’s national defence critic, echoed the sentiment, noting that the 18 parliamentarians were targeted not only for their involvement in IPAC but also for their crucial roles in engaging with diaspora communities in Canada. He highlighted that they frequently handle emails from diaspora groups containing “sensitive information” related to human rights repression by the Chinese communist regime, the Russian Federation, and Iran.
“Those diaspora communities send us emails, and if this APT31 hack had been successful, that sensitive information of the diaspora communities, of individuals who have come to Canada seeking asylum, and now call Canada home, their identities could have been jeopardized and could have been even more targeted,” he said.
“This is not just an attack on our parliamentary privilege, not just an attack on us as parliamentarians, but an attack on all Canadians in our democratic institutions because we do have dictatorships and authoritarian regimes like the People’s Republic of China that are trying to undermine our democratic institutions and target Chinese nationals right here in Canada.”