G7 Rapid Response Mechanism
The G7 Rapid Response Mechanism is an initiative introduced in the "Charlevoix Commitment on Defending Democracy from Foreign Threats", issued by the leaders of the G7 countries—United States, Canada, Japan, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy—on June 9, 2018, during their summit in Charlevoix, Quebec. The RRM's mandate is to strengthen the coordination of G7 member countries "to identify and respond to diverse and evolving threats to our democracies, including through sharing information and analysis, and identifying opportunities for coordinated response." The RRM initiative is led by Canada through Global Affairs Canada's Centre for International Digital Policy. The Group of Seven is an informal international intergovernmental economic organization that meets annually, whose members represent the seven wealthiest advanced economies in the world, according to the International Monetary Fund.
Mandate
The G7 Rapid Response Mechanism, announced at Charlevoix, was mandated by the Group of Seven to "strengthen coordination to prevent, thwart and respond to malign and evolving threats to G7 democracies...It "will share information and threat analysis related to various threats to democracy, and is an established mechanism to identify opportunities for coordinated response."According to the Institute for Research on Public Policy's Policy Options magazine, the "RRM initiative seeks to strengthen the leading democracies' "coordination to identify and respond to diverse and evolving threats…including through sharing information and analysis, and identifying opportunities for a coordinated response."
Administration
Tara Denham, who is also the Director of the Centre for International Digital Policy at Global Affairs Canada, directed the team responsible for setting up the Rapid Response Mechanism Coordination Unit. Global Affairs Canada—the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development—is the federal Canadian ministry responsible for diplomatic and consular relations, international trade, and international development and humanitarian assistance. The Centre for International Digital Policy includes the Digital Inclusion Lab and the G7 Rapid Response Mechanism. Denham is also the RRM's Canadian Focal Point.At a briefing on "the security and intelligence threats to elections" of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, the chair Bob Zimmer, said that the 2019 general election "may be different" from past elections in Canada. as the "tools that were used to strengthen civic engagement are being used to undermine, disrupt and destabilize democracy." He said, "democracies around the world have entered a new era—an era of heightened threat and heightened vigilance—and 2019 will see a number of countries brace for volleys of attempted disruption: India, Australia, Ukraine, Switzerland, Belgium, the EU and, of course, Canada. Evidence has confirmed that the most recent Canadian general election, in 2015, was unencumbered by interference, although there were some relatively primitive attempts to disrupt, misinform and divide. These efforts were few in number and uncoordinated, and had no visible impact on the voter, either online or in line." Zimmer described the three pillars. The first is "enhancing citizen preparedness" through the "digital citizen initiative", the second pillar is "improving organizational readiness" with national security and intelligence agencies supporting Elections Canada. The third pillar included the establishment of the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections Task Force which works as a team with the Communications Security Establishment, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, as well as Global Affairs Canada, to "ensure a comprehensive understanding of and response to any threats to Canada's democratic process." Zimmer said that as part of this third pillar, "We have activated the G7 rapid response mechanism, announced at the G7 leaders' summit in Charlevoix, to strengthen coordination among our G7 allies and to ensure that there is international collaboration and coordination in responding to foreign threats to democracy."
Background
Leaders of the G7 countries—United States, Canada, Japan, Britain, France, Germany and Italy, met in Charlevoix, Quebec in Canada from June 8 to 9, 2019. They committed to "cooperate in defending democracies from foreign threats and establish a response mechanism for that purpose". The Charlevoix Commitment on Defending Democracy from Foreign Threats was one of eight issued by member country leaders. Others include the Charlevoix Commitment on Equality and Economic Growth, the Charlevoix Commitment to End Sexual and Gender-Based Violence, Abuse and Harassment in Digital Contexts, the Charlevoix Declaration on Quality Education for Girls, Adolescent Girls and Women in Developing Countries, and the Charlevoix Commitment on Innovative Financing for Development.Charlevoix Commitment on Defending Democracy from Foreign Threats
The "Charlevoix Commitment on Defending Democracy from Foreign Threats" was one of eight declarations issued by the G7 leaders on June 9, 2018, during their summit at the Manoir Richelieu in Charlevoix, in the La Malbaie, Quebec. Charlevoix Commitment states that "foreign actors seek to undermine our democratic societies and institutions, our electoral processes, our sovereignty and our security. These malicious, multi-faceted and ever-evolving tactics constitute a serious strategic threat which we commit to confront together, working together with other governments that share our democratic values." The Charlevoix Summit resolved to "establish a G7 Rapid Response Mechanism to strengthen our coordination to identify and respond to diverse and evolving threats to our democracies, including through sharing information and analysis, and identifying opportunities for coordinated response."The Charlevoix Summit was the 44th G7 summit Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced five themes for Canada's G7 presidency which began in January 2018.
In January 2019, Policy Options said that, "the nascent Rapid Response Mechanism initiated in 2018 under Canada's G7 presidency to defend against foreign threats holds promise and could offer a valuable model of cooperation for future efforts to defend democracy and the ideas that underlie it." The RRM initiative seeks to strengthen the leading democracies' “coordination to identify and respond to diverse and evolving threats…including through sharing information and analysis, and identifying opportunities for a coordinated response."
2019 European Parliament election
's Rapid Response Mechanism Canada comprehensive report on the 2019 European Parliament election analyzed open data "related to foreign interference during and leading up to the 2019 European Union Parliamentary Elections, May 23–26, 2019". RRM Canada did not find "significant evidence of state-based foreign interference, or any large-scale, organized and coordinated efforts by non-state actors". They did find find that "national or international non-state actors" used tactics based on those used by the Russian sponsored Internet Research Agency in previous elections, "such as the 2016 U.S. Elections". For example, blogs, webpages, and social media accounts on Twitter, Facebook and Reddit "were used to spread divisive and false information to damage and negatively impact social cohesion and trust in democratic processes and institutions" in coordinated networks of Facebook groups.2019 Alberta general election
A May 2019 report by RRM Canada, which was published online on September 6, 2019 analyzed open source data including Twitter's platform in the period before the 2019 Alberta general election, which was held on April 16, 2019. The analysis was intended to "identify any emerging tactics in foreign interference and draw lessons learned for the Canadian general elections scheduled to take place in October 2019." While there was no foreign activity detected, the data revealed ""suspicious account creation pattern that is indicative of troll or bot activity".They found "automated inauthentic behaviour and trolling activities" but concluded that they were "very likely domestic in nature". The data showed "suspicious account creation pattern that is indicative of troll or bot activity", and "spikes in account creation" which suggested the "presence of accounts developed for a specific purpose." The accounts were very likely domestic and were "mainly supporters of the United Conservative Party." There was also a second small community with suspicious account creation pattern that were identified as supporters of the national People's Party of Canada. The report concluded that there was "no evidence supporting a broad, coordinated campaign to influence the Alberta election."
The report noted that "domestic actors" were "emulating" "tactics used by foreign actors, within the context of provincial elections and that this "behaviour will make it increasingly difficult to distinguish national from foreign interference efforts" in the upcoming 2019 Canadian federal election on October 21, 2019.