The Department of Canadian Heritage is seeking a larger budget for its Digital Citizens Initiative (DCI), saying millions more are needed to surveil internet users who promote “disinformation” and misinformation.
“The evaluation concludes that current DCI human and financial resources limit the achievement of additional outcomes and that more impact could be achieved through larger projects and a higher number of projects.”
The document proposed more funding for the $7.1 million-a-year program, whose stated aim is to “support democracy and social cohesion in Canada by building citizen resilience against online disinformation and building partnerships to support a healthy information ecosystem.”
“Disinformation impacts Canadians’ health and safety, civic discourse and engagement, political beliefs, perceptions of democratic institutions, confidence in political systems and trust in media,” said the report. “It may also amplify mistrust amongst communities, discrimination, stigma and marginalization and social divisions.”
The report did not give any specific examples of disinformation. It said the DCI had been able to respond quickly to “emerging situations such as the COVID-19 pandemic,” but had limited financial and human resources relative to the “size and scale of the overall problem.”
DCI had seen short and medium-term successes when it came to funding research and awareness activities and contributing to an “increased awareness of online digital issues among funding recipients and participants in its funded activities,” according to the report.
The report said that 42 percent of Canadians polled were “institution trusting” and had “high trust in institutional and authoritative sources of information” such as federal departments.
