Jagmeet Singh, NDP targeted by misinformation attacks, foreign interference inquiry hears

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and his party are being targeted by social media misinformation attacks that appear to be coming from outside Canada, the party's national director told the inquiry into foreign interference Thursday.

Lucy Watson said there has been an spike in recent weeks in the number of online misinformation posts, such as fake news stories purporting to be from the Toronto Star claiming Singh has been held on charges of corruption. 

"There are a number of posts along those lines that have been coming across our desks on a fairly regular basis," Watson told reporters after her testimony.

Watson said the party believes the posts are coming from foreign actors. She would not say which country the party suspects is behind the posts.

"We don't have any insight, which is one of the challenges," she said.

Watson said she fears the online attacks could lead to real-life violence.

"The discourse that we're seeing online, which is growing in intensity, in volume, in rhetoric, is feeding into some of what we're seeing in real life," she said.

Watson said she also worries about the impact of misinformation on the next election if nothing is done.

"I have very serious concerns about what the next election looks like if we are not taking seriously the discourse that we're seeing online and the way that it is translating in real life, in person," she said.

"As a party, we will be taking steps to ensure that we are preparing our candidates, that we're training our campaigns, so that they are equipped, to the extent possible, to navigate some of those challenges."

Testifying before the inquiry, Watson said there is a risk of foreign interference through disinformation and called it one of the areas where her party is vulnerable.

"We've seen bots, we've seen fake accounts, all of the things that are delineated in various documents that have been put before this commission," Watson said. "We have experienced all of those on our party accounts and on our leader's account."

Watson said the party reports the posts to the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (SITE) task force, which was set up to monitor online disinformation, and to Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram. She added it takes on average five to 10 days for the social media giant to respond and to act.

When it comes to misinformation posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, "it could only be responsive if we could contact them," she said. "We don't have a contact name."