Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Human Rights
Issue 16 - Evidence
OTTAWA, Monday, December 7, 2009
The Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights, to which was referred Bill S-223, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to enact certain other measures in order to provide assistance and protection to victims of human trafficking, met this day at 2:10 p.m. to give clause-by-clause consideration to the bill; and to examine the issue of the sexual exploitation of children in Canada, with a particular emphasis on understanding the scope and prevalence of the problem of the sexual exploitation of children across the country and in particularly affected communities.
Senator A. Raynell Andreychuk (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Honourable senators, welcome. I trust you can hear me. I lost my hearing, so I am not sure if I am shouting at you or speaking softly.
We are here to consider Bill S-223, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to enact certain other measures in order to provide assistance and protection to victims of human trafficking. We heard witnesses previously, and then, when this bill came in its present form, we heard from Senator Carstairs, the proponent of the bill. We also heard from the department officials on this case. We then circulated the evidence and asked for any further comments from the witnesses who had testified previously. I understand we received responses.
Adam Thompson, Clerk of the Committee: We received two responses from groups. Those responses were distributed to senators' offices late last week.
The Chair: While there were some helpful comments, I think there are still some concerns. Overall, they were ready to proceed with the bill as a first step, as I understand it.
Senators, we are ready to go to clause by clause, except that Senator Jaffer had raised a concern about the cancellation of permits. I think there was some misunderstanding as to the date that the department was to reflect on Senator Jaffer's point and come back to her.
However, I believe that they would be ready to respond before the committee. With the indulgence of the committee, I would ask the department officials to come forward. I would first ask all of the witnesses to identify themselves for the record.
Sarah Wells, Policy Analyst, Social Policy and Programs, Immigration Branch, Citizenship and Immigration Canada: I am Sarah Wells. I am an analyst in the Immigration Branch at Citizenship and Immigration Canada.
Eric Stevens, Counsel, Legal Services, Citizenship and Immigration Canada: My name is Eric Stevens and I am with Legal Services at Citizenship and Immigration Canada.
The Chair: With the concurrence of the committee, I would ask Senator Jaffer to put her point on the record.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you very much, chair.
My concern was that the permit can be cancelled at any time. In the explanation given to us last time, the department said that the intent is to provide immigration officers with the explicit discretion to cancel a victim of trafficking protection permit if the circumstances warranted it.
I had asked last time whether, instead of "cancel at any time," we could add the words "the circumstances may warrant it." Since then, you have looked into this, if I understand correctly, and you have provided an excellent explanation at very short notice as to why that cannot be done. I am satisfied with your explanation. However, I will ask you to either read the letter or give an explanation, so that it is on the record as well.
The Chair: Could we have your response for the record as to what Senator Jaffer was referring to?
Mr. Stevens: Thank you for the question and for the opportunity for us to respond.
The first thing I would like to say is that these words, "may cancel at any time," have been part of immigration legislation for decades. The current immigration law has these same words when we are dealing with all permanent or temporary resident permits.
Also, I would like to alert senators to the fact that these words were considered many years ago by the Supreme Court of Canada in a case entitled Minister of Manpower and Immigration v. Hardayal. It is a 1978 case by the Supreme Court of Canada, and Mr. Justice Spence, as he then was, looked at these very words and explained that the cancellation at any time would have to be done for proper motives and would have to be done fairly.
This is our historical understanding of these words. Over the years, we have developed procedures in the manual to ensure that fairness is accorded to individuals.
Moreover, when we are dealing with the protection of victims, the principle of statutory interpretation — that the law is to be given a large, liberal interpretation to best attain the objects of the statute — will also feed into any court's understanding of the ambit of the words "cancel at any time."
Senator Jaffer: Do you want to add anything?
I am satisfied with the explanation, so I will not be asking for a change on that. I will not be moving an amendment.
The Chair: Thank you.
Could I ask whether any other senators will be moving any amendments other than those given to us as an agreed amendment package between the department, the government and Senator Carstairs? I see no hands jumping up.
Since it was an agreed package negotiated between Senator Carstairs and the department and given that all senators are in agreement, we can then go to clause-by-clause consideration of Bill S-223. When we come to the amendments, Senator Jaffer is here, I think with the concurrence of Senator Carstairs, to introduce those, and the department is in agreement with the amendments. We can go through that process.
Honourable senators, is it agreed that the committee move to clause-by-clause consideration of Bill S-223?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: No opposition. Shall the title stand postponed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: No opposition. Shall clause 1 stand postponed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Is it agreed? No one is opposing? Agreed.
Shall clause 2 carry?
Senator Jaffer: I have an amendment to clause 2, if I may, by replacing lines 6 to 17 on page 1. Basically, we need to keep it the same as it is known in other legislation. These changes will happen a number of times. It should be known as "trafficking in persons" rather than "human trafficking." My amendment is to add "trafficking in persons."
The Chair: I believe all senators received the package of amendments, so we can follow those.
You are proposing that Bill S-223, in clause 2, be amended by replacing lines 6 to 17 on page 1 with the following:
The purpose of this Part is to provide for specific legislative measures to assist and protect victims of trafficking in persons who are without legal status in Canada by providing a means for them to legalize their status as temporary residents and facilitating their eventual acquisition of permanent resident status in appropriate circumstances.
I believe Senator Jaffer has given the explanation. Is there any discussion?
Is it agreed to adopt the motion?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: It is agreed.
Shall clause 2 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Agreed? Carried.
We will move to clause 3. I believe Senator Jaffer has an amendment.
Senator Jaffer: I would like clause 3 to be amended by replacing lines 1 to 15 on page 2 with the following:
24.1 (1) In this section and in section 24.2, "victim of trafficking in persons" means a foreign national who is a victim, as defined in section 2 of the Criminal Code, of the offence set out in section 279.01 of that Act or in section 118 of this Act.
(2) An officer may, at the request of a foreign national who is inadmissible or does not meet the requirements of this Act, issue a victim of trafficking protection permit — which may be cancelled at any time — authorizing
After "authorizing," it stays the same. That is my amendment.
The Chair: Honourable senators, you have the text before you, with the underlined amendment portions. Can we take that as read?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Agreed. Is it agreed, honourable senators, to adopt Senator Jaffer's motion?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Shall clause 3 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Clause 4?
Senator Jaffer: If you look at page 2, this would be replacing lines 21 to 31. The first amendment is again what we had earlier on —
The Chair: We did all three parts of the amendment already, so we are on to clause 4. Colleagues took the changes as read; I think you gave us the reason. Let us go to clause 4 on page 3. I believe you have an amendment to clause 4.
Senator Jaffer: I would like to amend clause 4, lines 37 to 38 on page 3, by adding ". . .of trafficking protection permit."
The Chair: It is replacing lines 37 and 38 on page 3 with ". . . resident permit or a victim of trafficking protection permit."
Senator Jaffer: Between "victim" and "protection" I wish to add "of trafficking."
The Chair: Is it agreed, honourable senators, to adopt the motion?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Agreed. Shall clause 4 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Senator Jaffer: I will continue on page 3, lines 42 and 43. Again, my amendment to clause 5 would read: "resident permit or victim of trafficking protection permit." Add "of trafficking."
The Chair: Is it agreed, honourable senators, to adopt the amendment?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Shall clause 5 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Go to clause 6.
Senator Jaffer: It is the same amendment to clause 6, on line 47 of page 3. Add the words "of trafficking" between "victim" and "protection."
The Chair: Is it agreed to adopt the motion to amend clause 6?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Shall clause 6, as amended, carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Shall clause 7 carry?
Senator Jaffer: We have to defeat this clause. There are no amendments to clause 7 and clause 8.
Mr. Thompson: If I may explain, the agreement between Senator Carstairs and the department was to delete clauses 7 and 8. Procedurally, a motion to delete a clause is not in order. The proper procedure if the committee wishes to remove a clause would be to defeat the clause.
The Chair: Shall clause 7 carry?
Hon. Senators: No.
The Chair: Therefore, the clause is defeated.
Shall clause 8 carry?
Hon. Senators: No.
The Chair: The clause is defeated.
There is an amendment in clause 9.
Senator Jaffer: I move the following:
This Act comes into force on the day that is one year after the day on which it receives royal assent or on an earlier day to be fixed by order of the Governor in Council.
The Chair: Is it agreed, honourable senators, to adopt the motion?
Senator Dallaire: Is this because the department cannot implement it more quickly?
Senator Jaffer: My understanding is that the department may be able to implement it, but if not, they have one year to do it. They have to bring in regulations and all that.
Senator Dallaire: That takes longer than six months?
Senator Jaffer: That is my understanding.
Martha Vaughan, Manager, Women's Health Division, Programs Directorate, Health Canada: My understanding is that if it is completed in six months, it can be implemented according to this. However, we have up to one year to do that work.
Senator Dallaire: Up to one year or an earlier date as fixed by order of the Governor-in-Council.
The Chair: Is it agreed, honourable senators, to adopt the motion?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Shall clause 9 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
We will go back to clause 1.
Senator Jaffer: We have to amend clause 1 as well to be in line with what we have agreed to elsewhere. It should say "victims of trafficking in persons."
The Chair: We have a motion by Senator Jaffer to amend clause 1 by replacing lines 4 and 5 on page 1 with the following:
1. This Act may be cited as the Victims of Trafficking in Persons Protection Act.
Shall the amendment carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Shall clause 1 as amended carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
I understand there is a further amendment for the long title of Bill S-223. It shall be amended by replacing the long title on page 1 with the following:
An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (victims of trafficking in persons)
Senator Jaffer is moving the motion.
Senator Jaffer: I so move.
The Chair: Shall the amendment to the title carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Shall the long title carry?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Is it agreed that this bill be adopted as amended?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Does the committee wish to consider appending observations to the report?
Hon. Senators: No.
The Chair: Is it agreed that I will report this bill as amended to the Senate?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Carried.
Thank you, honourable senators and department officials. I will be able to file the report of the committee on Bill S-223 as amended tomorrow.
We propose to deal with the issue of Resolution 1325. We have been studying this resolution and we want to call a few more witnesses. The steering committee has met from time to time to discuss how to conclude this report and what would be the most beneficial way to deal with appropriate recommendations with respect to public policy on Resolution 1325. The steering committee proposes that we hear other witnesses as and when we can.
Senator Dallaire will have to help me. One witness is in the Department of National Defence?
Senator Dallaire: Yes, she is at National Defence.
The Chair: I understand this woman was to come before us but has been ill with H1N1 and other issues. We felt she needed the time to get better. We can hear her when we return after the Christmas break. Another witness, Carolyn McAskie, was part of the Peacebuilding Commission in Sierra Leone and Burundi. She was instrumental in some of the initial times when the issue of conflict was examined by the UN in a more systemized way. She has not been available.
We suggest to the committee that we hear these two witnesses and any others we think are necessary. I would ask senators to reflect by the first full week in January and let us know if there is any other witness you think would be necessary. We could cluster them and see if we can have one more session on Resolution 1325 when we return.
The steering committee also struggled with the fact that we seem to have been pointed in three directions on Resolution 1325. The principal part of our study has been how Canada has educated itself and its citizens about Resolution 1325, how the resolution has been implemented throughout the bureaucracy and how it has been used by parliamentarians. In other words, what is the effect of Resolution 1325? Has it been implemented in any meaningful way in Canada? We can reflect on the testimony in that regard.
It is a United Nations resolution. The United Nations has many bodies in conflict areas with resources that all countries contribute to, and it should be a leader on these resolutions once they are passed in the UN. It has a mandate to do so. We have been looking at whether the UN has been successful in using this mechanism.
There are conflict countries and other countries. We can learn from whether the conflict countries have taken Resolution 1325 on board seriously and whether it has made a difference in the lives of those caught in conflict.
In that, of course, there is a subset: Canada supports multilateral agencies and, bilaterally, many countries. Have we utilized and maximized Resolution 1325 for the benefit of the recipients of this aid?
Together with the research staff, we have looked at many ways we could bring the study together. The one that was proffered this summer still seems to be the best, and that is a case study — to go on the ground where the victims of conflict exist, where some of the most difficult conflicts either are in the process of being resolved, are still in conflict or are in a post-conflict area.
We looked at a number of case studies that might be appropriate. In a case study, you can look at what Canada is doing, what the country is doing and what the UN is doing and use that as indicative of the shortcomings of Resolution 1325 in its implementation and of where the successes are. It would be on the ground to look at.
We looked at Haiti as a possibility, together with some countries in Central America and a number of countries in Africa. We also did a global scan, but it seemed that those are the hot spots where there is some recognition of conflict issues and where Resolution 1325 may or may not have been applied.
The steering committee is proposing that there be a case study that involves travel to Liberia and Sierra Leone. Those two countries seem to have had more done around Resolution 1325 and they are also very extreme conflict areas. As you know, Liberia has been in a brutal civil war. It has recently come out of it with some peace, but it is a relative peace. The president of the country, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, has been very much concerned about women in the conflict area and conflict resolution, and her country continues to struggle in that area.
A centre has been set up, and the Governor General was part of that process, together with many leaders from around the world. There has been a lot of thought in that country on how to handle conflict and what would be supporting mechanisms that could be helpful. There is a lot we could learn within Resolution 1325. When I say Resolution 1325, it includes all the subsequent resolutions that have come forward from it.
The other country is Sierra Leone, where we know the horrific toll that the mutilation and the war took on the citizens. Senator Jaffer and I were there with the Speaker from the House of Commons on a development shortly after the peace process and the special tribunal were put in place. The victims were the most worrying, and whether this truth commission would work and whether the court would address the issues that needed to be addressed.
Two countries would be two examples with two different histories and two different approaches to conflict resolution, which may be helpful in looking at how Canada could address conflict in a generic way and Resolution 1325 specifically. The proposal is an on-site visit to those two countries.
Because travel is so difficult into Africa in those places, it appears likely that we would have to go through Ghana. If we transited through Ghana, there would be some reason to look at Ghana as well. It has stabilized and is now looking to be one of the most sustainable development countries in Africa. The Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre is there, in which Africans look at their own problems concerning women in conflict and conflict issues. It would be good to stop there and to take note of what is happening.
On that basis, as you recall, we thought this might function as a bit of a subcommittee. However, we could not be a subcommittee; we would be a full committee. Because the participation of all senators has been rather good, if I may say — I sound like a schoolteacher — there has been a great interest in it.
We have to apply for funds if we are to travel outside of Ottawa. For this travel to Sierra Leone, Liberia and maybe a stop in Ghana, we will be asking Internal Economy, if you approve, for nine members — in other words, the entire component. I am not sure everyone will go, but we will have to make the request on that basis because that is the policy of Internal Economy, that all members should be afforded the right to travel if there will be travel. We are also proposing one researcher and one clerk.
There is a little subset that I will mention as well. Apparently, in Internal Economy, there is an indication that despite the number of hours travelled, committee staff travel in economy, even if it is outside of the country. That seems highly unfair, because parliamentary associations — including clerks, staff, et cetera — travel in business class, along with all of the other categories. We think we should ask for the same right for business class for the staff as we are for committees.
We understand that we will probably get a good hearing on that because Internal Economy has been looking at that. It is not asking for anything above and beyond what would be normal public service rules. To travel to Africa must be through Europe, which is about a 20-hour trip, with the seven- or eight-hour layover and another seven hours of flight. That is also factored in. The cost is there.
Senator Munson: The Treasury Board guidelines are anything over nine hours.
The Chair: I think it is eight now. I have not looked at it. I do know that for clerks and staff on trips to Africa, which is the area I am aware of, they have had access to business class and not economy. That is discretionary, but we have built it into the budget on the condition that they would. We think it is an appropriate request because it is a gruelling trip and we want to condense it into one week, using the weekends for travel. Therefore, we need to approve the budget to go to Internal Economy later this week, if the committee agrees.
Another subset is that we have not set a time for the trip. We were looking at January as a possibility, but due to caucus meetings and other issues, including getting the trip properly put together, there would not be time in January. We have not nailed it down, but we are looking for a week when the Senate is not sitting. It could possibly be March or later, but we would want to go in with our budget and be ready to do it.
The floor is open for any questions, discussion or reaction; or are we ready to move this? We have had informal discussions, but not formally.
Senator Dallaire: If we go beyond the fiscal year, do we have to go back?
The Chair: Yes. Everything fails March 31 and starts again, including all of our allotments, all financial. There is no carry-over, as I understand. Senator Jaffer can correct me; she sits on Internal.
If there is no discussion, do we have someone to move the motion?
Senator Jaffer: I am on the steering committee. Perhaps Senator Brazeau or Senator Munson could move it.
Senator Munson: What is the expectation of how many senators will go?
The Chair: Probably five.
Senator Munson: I so move.
The Chair: Agreed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: Do we have any other issues?
Senator Jaffer: I asked our side, and everyone is interested in going. That is why we have to be careful.
The Chair: We know everyone is interested, but there are other conflicts with other organizations. We are purposely not seeking any pairing during a sitting week on this travel. That is in line with what others are doing in respect of international travel.
Our study on sexual exploitation might involve national travel when it is available and when the whips allow.
Senator Munson: The expectation is either mid-February or mid-March. Is that right?
The Chair: There are one-week breaks in each of February and March and a two-week break in April. If we present this budget to Internal Economy, then it would be a known item to that committee, even if we had to go back for additional funds. I hope the budget would be on the books as reasonable and feasible.
Is there anything else on Resolution 1325?
Senator Dallaire: I have one point, if I may put it out now because of the gentleman's availability. We had a Canadian judge on the Special Court for Sierra Leone for six years. His name is Pierre Boutet, from Quebec City. It would be appropriate to get his perspective of the tribunal; he has been there for a long time and has seen the evolution from a judicial and legal dimension and how the tribunal saw the evolution of this resolution into their duties.
The Chair: There are a number of potential witnesses, but the question is whether we should hear from them after we go with fresh eyes. Professor William Schabas was also a member of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission. I have talked to them both and found that they have very fixed views. In some ways, it might be better to hear from the people on the ground and then hear from the others afterward. They would be good witnesses.
Senator Dallaire: Although the tribunal is in it the appeal phase, the lead judge of that court is also significant. I agree with you entirely that we should travel to the field first and then invite those witnesses to appear before the committee after we return.
The Chair: That takes care of Resolution 1325. We need a motion to file as an exhibit the report of September 30, 2009, prepared by Senator Dallaire. Senator Dallaire met with the delegation from Burma and has given us an excellent report. I need a motion.
Senator Jaffer: I so move.
The Chair: Agreed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: We will file that report.
Senator Dallaire: The staff from committee and my personal staff did a highly proper job of protocol, decorum and content in handling the Burma delegation. As the report states, they found it to be a worthwhile endeavor. The committee and staff can be applauded for doing a good job.
The Chair: Do we need to move in camera for any other issues?
On our study of sexual exploitation, we will travel. If there are any other witnesses that we should hear before the committee in Ottawa, a note will go out as a reminder by December 15. Also, I would like to have by mid-January the areas where we might go to hear evidence from potential witnesses. At steering, we have been talking about travelling west and east and doing the checks and balances. Today is the opportunity to say where you think the committee should travel to hear evidence. I would like to hear back if members have any ideas on areas and specific witnesses. For example, we should go to Saskatoon or Regina. I could provide a list of witnesses and topics for that area. Perhaps Northern Manitoba, The Pas or Flin Flon would be a good idea. We want to cover any possible areas for hearings. Within that, we are developing a youth participation component. I would ask that members provide any leads they might have on youth groups.
Can we go in camera for five minutes?
(The committee continued in camera.)
(The committee resumed in public.)
The Chair: Honourable senators, this is the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights. We are here to examine the issue of the sexual exploitation of children in Canada, with a particular emphasis on understanding the scope and prevalence of the problem of sexual exploitation of children across the country and in particularly affected communities.
We have two presenters by way of video conference and one presenter here with us in Ottawa.
From the Hospital for Sick Children-Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect, called SCAN, are Tanya Smith; Jennifer Coolbear, psychologist; and Jasmine Eliav, psychologist. Will there be one presentation or three?
Tanya Smith, Hospital for Sick Children-Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect (SCAN): I will be presenting on behalf of all of us.
The Chair: The rest will be assisting you, then.
From Vigilance on the net, we have Ginette Yapety; and from Microsoft, we have Michael Eisen, the chief legal officer.
Since we have not had an indication of who wants to go first, I will start in the order I have introduced them. I will turn to Ms. Smith from SCAN. I trust you can make a short intervention so we can have sufficient time to ask questions at the end.
Ms. Smith: Thank you for the opportunity to provide the Senate with an overview of the work we are doing in the area of Internet sexual exploitation of children and youth. I hope to provide you with a better understanding of the issues facing child and youth victims of Internet sexual exploitation. As well, I would like to show how, as medical and mental health clinicians, we are providing service, identifying children and youth at risk, and educating clinicians about this growing problem.
Our program, the Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect program at the Hospital for Sick Children — SickKids — is a multi-disciplinary team. We provide medical and psychosocial assessment to children and youth.
Over the past few years, there has been an increase in the number of sexual abuse and assault cases that have had a component of the Internet linked to their cases. As practitioners, we have had to increase our understanding of how Canadian children and youth are being impacted by their Internet use and whether particular patterns of use are leading to an increased risk of exploitation. As well, we felt the need to develop unique treatment approaches to ensure victims and their families receive high-quality care.
There is a dearth of literature describing and examining children and youth who are victims of Internet exploitation in Canada. Children and youth are being victimized in a number of different ways. Currently, we are seeing a number of cases where children and youth are being sexually abused or assaulted and images or video are being taken of the abuse and shared and distributed on the Internet. We also see children and youth being groomed or lured online, and we are also seeing children and youth who have had caregivers charged with possession of child pornography.
The impact of Internet sexual exploitation is significant. Victimization not only includes the sexual abuse trauma that may exist but, more significantly, the emotional trauma that victims experience, either face to face or online with the offenders.
Those children and youth who have had images or videos taken of the sexual abuse face the trauma of the abuse as well as the recurrent victimization, as we all know the images will remain on the Internet forever. Those children and youth who are groomed or lured online have been harmed emotionally by the predatory nature of the communication these offenders use. This particular issue has recently been further supported by a decision last week at the Supreme Court of Canada that highlighted that the communication aspect of online luring is itself a significant form of harm.
As well, there is a need for education for children, youth and families to understand healthy sexual online relationships.
Given the emerging research about the prevalence and potential impact on victims of online exploitation, it is important that specialized services for assessment and treatment be consistent with current approaches and treatment modalities for children who have experienced trauma and victimization.
Given all of these issues, the child and youth Internet sexual exploitation program at SickKids has developed a clinical service for the assessment and treatment of child and youth victims of Internet sex crimes. The main purpose of this program is to develop and provide a standardized service of care for children and youth sexually exploited online, with the goal of improving the standard of care for victims and their families.
I would like to highlight some unique themes that have emerged from our program.
The current research project provides an examination of a high-risk clinical Canadian sample that is unique, as the large majority of the research on victims of Internet exploitation is based on large U.S. normative samples. Our research described offender and victim characteristics of these Internet exploitation cases and helped understand and identify the common vulnerabilities and risk factors for this population.
Our clinical findings are consistent with what the research is stating. Specifically, research suggests that Internet use by high-risk youth differs in character from other Internet users. David Finkelhor and his research team at the Crimes against Children Research Center in New Hampshire have been conducting online victimization studies since 2001 and have found that many of the youth who are lured and victimized online experience negative life events and off-line victimization and depression and had experienced physical or sexual abuse or high parental conflict.
Overall, our clinical and research findings are providing a much stronger link between off-line experiences of children and youth that lead to vulnerability and online victimization. We also found that youth are more likely to develop online relationships if they are having difficulty at home, are troubled with depression or have little parental monitoring.
These preliminary clinical findings have guided our practice in terms of targeting high-risk Canadian children and youth. As well, our role has expanded to educate clinicians about identifying kids who may be at risk for online victimization. We will be developing and validating a screening tool to assist service providers in assessing Internet sexual exploitation. A clinical treatment service for victims and their families will be disseminated provincially and nationally.
To date, much of the attention toward Internet sexual exploitation has been focused on law enforcement, which has been critical to combat the problem. We feel that attention should also be paid to Canadian children and youth victims and the unique issues they face. A collaborative effort among all systems, including law enforcement, child protection, medical and mental health, is vital to better understand all elements of this issue.
Finally, we believe that further research is desperately needed in this country to better inform clinicians about the current issues facing our children and youth to improve their lives in the face of advancing technology.
My colleagues and I thank you for the opportunity to speak today and to share our work with you. We speak on behalf of the children and youth in our country who are not here today but who are directly impacted by Internet sexual exploitation and who need us to provide them with the highest quality of care, which they deserve.
Michael Eisen, Chief Legal Officer, Microsoft: Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to speak with you today. I am the chief legal officer for Microsoft Canada, and I have been asked to speak about CETS, the Child Exploitation Tracking System. That is a software solution developed to assist law enforcement in their investigations of online child exploitation.
I will start with a brief history of how CETS came to be. In 2003, a Toronto police officer, then Detective Sergeant Paul Gillespie, sent an email message to Bill Gates. As Mr. Gillespie has said to me on many occasions, the last thing in the world he expected was an answer. However, he did get an answer; Bill Gates passed the email on to Microsoft Canada, and we took it from there.
Mr. Gillespie's email was sent out of frustration because he felt that police did not have the technological capability to keep up with those using the Internet to exploit children. We quickly learned that a significant obstacle facing police investigators related to communication challenges.
For example, they were unable to link bits of information — credit card numbers, online handles, email addresses — from investigations across provincial and international jurisdictions. They desperately needed a tool to collaborate better with one another.
The solution, using web-based technology, was to build CETS, which allows multiple law enforcement agencies to share information and collaborate on child exploitation investigations. CETS permits investigators to easily organize, analyze, share and search information from the point of detection right through the investigative phase, arrest and defender management.
CETS's benefits include better communication. Traditional policing is characterized by geographical limitations. Every police agency has jurisdictional borders, whether municipal, provincial or national, beyond which it does not routinely operate.
By contrast, Internet child predators carry on without regard to borders. Images and videos of child abuse and torture that are produced in Britain, for example, are accessed and viewed in Canada and Australia. This has more often than not created a gap between what criminals can do and how the police are able to respond.
We hope that CETS helps to close that gap. Law enforcement agencies are now better able to work seamlessly across borders, using the best technological tools available.
A second benefit is to increase the efficiency of investigations. Online child exploitation often involves a flood of electronic data criss-crossing the globe non-stop. No human investigator could possibly gather, absorb and organize all of this data. CETS helps police agencies to share crucial information that had previously gone unshared. The system also makes critical links between pieces of information that have been overlooked or lost in the sheer volume of Internet traffic.
A third benefit is unified response. CETS had helped law enforcement agencies in Canada and around the world to work in tandem to help solve this borderless crime.
CETS officially launched in 2005 with 25 participating police forces in Canada, including the RCMP. It is now being used by over 40 law enforcement agencies in our country. Today, in addition, to being used across Canada, CETS is also used in nine other countries: the U.K., Indonesia, Italy, Spain, Brazil, Chile, Poland, Romania and Australia. Five other countries are on track to begin using CETS in the future.
To date, Microsoft has invested more than $12 million in the development, advancement and deployment of CETS, and the application is provided to law enforcement by Microsoft free of charge. All of that being said, I am particularly proud of the fact that CETS is a made-in-Canada solution created by Microsoft in this country, in close collaboration with law enforcement, and with the Toronto Police Service and the RCMP in particular.
I do not mean to suggest that Microsoft is an expert on the issue of child exploitation. Police are the experts. Microsoft's role was to use technology to contribute to the creation of a tool that could help police track pedophiles and those who seek to exploit children online.
We remain committed to CETS simply because it is the right thing to do. We have a special responsibility to help prevent, hinder or make it difficult for those who attempt to use technology for illegal and immoral purposes.
The extent of the problem is daunting. There are an estimated 1 million images of child abuse on the Internet involving an estimated 50,000 different victims from around the world. INTERPOL, The International Criminal Police Organization, reports that fewer than 1,000 of these victims have been identified and rescued.
We cannot relent. Microsoft Canada's approach is to work with recognized experts and committed industry partners to help address four fundamental aspects of online safety as a whole. CETS is one element. We also need to improve education and awareness so parents know how to protect their children online. This is a gap. We need to work in support of legislation and policy by helping lawmakers and law enforcement agencies develop laws and policies to enhance online safety and privacy. Finally, companies like Microsoft need to ensure that the technology we offer to Canadians helps keep families safe and their computers secure.
Canada should continue to lead this issue globally. We have the experience, the skills and — I would hope — the motivation. In November, for example, a delegate from a South African law enforcement agency received training on CETS in Canada from Paul Gillespie's Kids' Internet Safety Alliance. This was an historic moment in the global fight against child exploitation. It marked the first time an African government has taken an initiative to join the battle. Thanks in part to CETS, the world is looking to Canada for guidance, and we should provide it.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Eisen. Now, we will turn to Ginette Yapety, Vigilance on the net.
Ginette Yapety, Vigilance on the net: Good afternoon, honourable senators. I would like to thank you for giving us the opportunity to present our program, Vigilance on the net. This awareness-raising campaign was developed by Videotron in 2007 to inform Quebec families of the potential dangers they can encounter on the web and to show them ways to protect themselves better.
Several events led to the creation of this program. As an Internet service provider, Videotron felt that it had a moral obligation to better inform and support its clientele, namely families surfing the web. Our first action was to give parental control software to our Internet customers for free. We are still doing that.
We knew that was not enough. We also realized that not enough action was being taken in Quebec on Internet security. This was especially true if we compared ourselves to similar initiatives in Europe, the United States and the rest of Canada.
We decided to conduct a survey with Léger Marketing to identify areas where we could better contribute. We interviewed teenagers aged 12 to 17 years and their parents. We asked similar questions to both. What caught our attention is that 80 per cent of teenagers know a lot about the web and its potential dangers and were born with a mouse if their hands. However, most of them do not navigate safely.
The survey showed that 31 per cent of these teenagers had been exposed to conversations of a sexual nature with other teenagers or adults. Twenty-five per cent had sent a picture of themselves to someone they had met on the web — especially girls. Eight per cent of teenagers had met a stranger they had talked to on the web in person. Although parents were aware of these dangers, they underestimated their frequency and did not know how to talk to their teenagers about them.
At this point, we knew we wanted to build an awareness-raising program for teenagers. How do you get them to listen? They think they know more than most adults concerning the web, and, very often, they do.
To get results with this age group, we decided to build a live presentation and to have it delivered by someone they knew and identified as cool. We chose Antoine Mongrain as an entertainer and presenter because he had been doing a television show on VRAK.TV and in high schools for a few years. He is totally at ease with teenagers.
To build the content of the presentation, we chose the best expert we could find, Denis Talbot, who has been on MusiquePlus for the past 13 years. Mr. Talbot is a gaming and web expert and is also well-known by teenagers, especially boys.
With these two winning elements, we started touring Quebec high schools in the fall of 2007. We simply contacted schools and asked them to bring together several hundred students in an auditorium during class hours. From the start, we were able to convince schools even if they had not heard of the program before.
That is when we realized how much teachers were craving this type or information. We also realized the degree to which they were lost and did not know how to address the subject with teenagers. The Ministry of Education in Quebec is strongly encouraging schools to address the issue of Internet safety with their students, though no educational material is made available to help them accomplish this.
We have given this presentation to approximately 25,000 teenagers across Quebec. We have been giving almost the same presentation to their parents in the evenings to help them better understand the world in which their kids are living. In our presentation, we address the five major dangers of the web as identified by Denis Talbot. These are computer viruses and other security threats that can lead to invasion of privacy; receiving unwanted ads or spam; phishing, which is a method used by hackers to obtain personal information that leads to fraud and identity theft; choosing passwords that are not secure enough and can be easily stolen; and chatting and using social networks where teenagers share tremendous amounts of personal information and pictures of themselves. We added cyber bullying, which is an ever increasing problem for both teenagers and teachers.
Girls are usually more attracted to activities such as chatting and using social networks like MySpace or Facebook. The problem is that they do not see any danger in sharing personal information with complete strangers. They even send sexy pictures of themselves to people they know can become dangerous if the person does not like them anymore. Many cases of cyber bullying start this way. It is even possible for a hacker to send a teenage girl pictures of her taken with her own webcam because it was not turned off.
We give girls different types of advice to help them deal with the problems or sexual harassment and cyber bullying. For example, we tell them to be careful with the type of pseudonym they choose when they are chatting. If they call themselves "sexy girl 96," it is a clear call to pedophiles that this girl is 13 years old and is a good target as a potential victim.
The objective of Vigilance on the net is to educate teenagers to better protect themselves against such evils. If they are going through difficult situations, we refer them to Tel-Jeunes, a Quebec-based organization that receives more than 70,000 calls or emails per year from teenagers experiencing all types of problems. Their team of specialists offers sound advice to young people who are often afraid to talk to their parents about their problems.
With almost no publicity and a budget that is extremely limited, the Vigilance on the net tour has had tremendous success. There are more and more schools that would like us to bring the tour to their students. The problems encountered on the web by teenagers are multiplying and taking different forms. We are, therefore, working on an extension of the Vigilance on the net program to be able to offer it to more schools, more classes and more teenagers.
Surfing the web is like riding in a car: it can be dangerous, but that does not mean you should not do it. We are trying to help teenagers build their own seat belts and to develop their own security instincts. Hopefully, they will also be better equipped as adults to help their children deal with the dangers of the web.
The Chair: We have heard three interesting presentations that will be helpful in our study. The questions are limitless.
Senator Jaffer: There are many questions. Mr. Eisen, I am curious to know what you have done in Canada. You said that you are building partnerships and you named the relevant countries. I was pleased to hear that South Africa is involved. Are you working at the same level with Asian countries? How do you set up the network?
Mr. Eisen: Canada can best be described as the flagship deployment. After we built and deployed CETS in Canada, a small group of us took it on the road. We went to a number of jurisdictions in Europe and in Asia where we thought there would be interest. In selecting the countries, it is appropriate to ensure that they have the appropriate legal regime such that it is unlawful to do the kinds of things we are helping the police to investigate. That is a rather long-winded answer to your question.
The short answer is that we started in Canada, attempted to introduce the technology to police forces around the world and, based on decisions they eventually made, were able to bring nine countries on board. A number of other countries are looking at CETS. Initially, each of these countries will build its own database for policing its country. Eventually, there will be international data-sharing arrangements and a global network.
Senator Jaffer: Do you help countries to network? Do they work together or do they work in silos?
Mr. Eisen: It is a combination of both. For example, Microsoft will work with some frequency with the RCMP to bring interested police departments from around the world to the RCMP facility in Ottawa. We also help to facilitate an international users' conference once per year. Each country, as it becomes involved, works locally, but Microsoft attempts to facilitate global interaction and collaboration. The ultimate goal is to have an information-sharing network.
Senator Jaffer: Ms. Yapety, you said that you speak to young people. The biggest problems occur with those who are most vulnerable. What efforts are you able to make in that area? We are all struggling with this. Do you have any creative ways to reach the young people who are the most vulnerable or marginalized in society?
Ms. Yapety: The best creative way we have found is to bring in a well-known television personality, such as Antoine Mongrain. Young people naturally go to him after conferences and tell him about their problems. He then refers them to the police or to Tel-Jeunes or to a psychologist who could help these children better than he could. We found that having a public figure helped people to speak out who would not have spoken otherwise. That is a big help, but we are not the best at doing this, and that is why we developed an alliance with Tel-Jeunes, because they are better equipped to help young people. We encourage young people to talk to someone, whether an adult they know or Tel-Jeunes or their parents. Often we find that they do not speak to their parents first. As you said, it is difficult.
Senator Poy: Mr. Eisen, what does CETS stand for?
Mr. Eisen: It stands for Child Exploitation Tracking System.
Senator Poy: You listed a number of countries, but I do not believe Thailand was among them.
Mr. Eisen: That is correct.
Senator Poy: Why does Thailand not participate? Do their police have to approach Microsoft to be part of this system?
Mr. Eisen: Yes. It is open to any police agency to contact Microsoft and express interest. Following that, in appropriate circumstances, we arrange to assist them in determining whether they have the appropriate infrastructure, and so on. That any given country is not included is a function of the fact that for whatever reason it has not expressed interest or, having expressed interest, is not at the point where it is able to deploy.
Senator Poy: Currently, is CETS the most effective system for tracking Internet sex crime?
Mr. Eisen: That is a difficult question to answer. I can say only that the anecdotal feedback we receive from police forces around the world that are using it is that it provides a distinct advantage that they did not have previously and cannot get elsewhere. I do not know whether that means it is better than anything else.
Senator Poy: Are other systems doing similar work?
Mr. Eisen: I believe there are a number of technologies that do different things similar to what CETS does. I am not aware of any technology or solution that does all of the things that CETS does in a single package.
Senator Poy: I see. I find it interesting that Canada is the lead in this area and the letter went to Bill Gates. Why did he start the program in Canada and not in the U.S.? Is there a specific reason?
Mr. Eisen: Microsoft operates worldwide, but in many respects it operates locally. If Mr. Gates receives something from Canada, he refers it to the Microsoft folks in Canada.
Senator Poy: Ms. Yapety, how often are presentations done in a high school? Are they repeated every year or are they done only once?
Ms. Yapety: We have been touring different regions. We went to the Quebec City region and visited different schools. In the same school, we would repeat the same presentation three or four times during the day — three times during the day with the students and once in the evening with their parents present. The next day, we would go to a different school. We have been doing it in tours like this. It costs a lot of money and takes a lot of time to organize, so we are now looking at ways to package the information so that we can reach all schools in all regions. Once we have done the presentation at one level, six months later they are asking us for presentations to the other level, or six months after that it is needed for new kids who have joined the school. It is never ending, and so we are looking at ways to multiply or combine our efforts, because all schools need it.
Senator Poy: You are talking about live presentations. Could you make DVDs of them and replay them in the schools?
Ms. Yapety: We tried that but it did not work well because it was not interactive enough. We tried to tape the conference and replay it in the schools, but it did not work. Now, we are building interactive DVDs. We will show a situation with comedians and then the teachers will stop the DVD and have a discussion in class followed by a continuation of the material provided. The goal is to get young people to talk about this, because they are often isolated with their problems. We realize that they have discussions among themselves, but we cannot do that in an auditorium. They can do the exercises in class with the guidance of the DVD, which provides an opportunity to stop and have a discussion at any time. We can achieve better things this way.
The Chair: Ms. Smith, you are from the Hospital for Sick Children, and I believe the program is under that. We have spent the last number of decades trying to train the psychologists, the social workers and the educators on how to identify child abuse and how to interview young people. We have had some hits and misses in that, because conducting an interview with a child is different than doing it with an adult.
Have you had to change all of your training for the psychologists and case workers on identifying and speaking to a young person with respect to the Internet, as opposed to in the neighbourhood? In other words, is there a different investigative technique that must be employed? Are we having to retrain all of our professionals who work with an abused child who has been abused because of the Internet and online, in order to identify and understand how to deal with that?
Ms. Smith: That is a very good question. The short answer is yes. While many traditional forms of training and information around sexual abuse are still important for these clinicians to have, there are unique aspects that are different and new for clinicians to better understand children who are at risk for Internet exploitation.
A lot of that stems from the fact that our generation, who are mainly the clinicians, psychologists and social workers, really do not have a good understanding of the Internet in general. We are finding we are not only educating around risky behaviours online that children may be experiencing, but just around the Internet and what it means and how much a part of the lives of youth the Internet is. That is one piece.
The investigative piece of this is unique. We work very closely with law enforcement officers who are specialized in Internet exploitation. These cases are unique; they take a different approach. We really have to understand the dynamics of the case in order to better treat and identify many of the victims.
It is requiring a whole new approach. We have spent a lot of our time working with clinicians and educating or re-educating them around new identifying techniques and dynamics related to this population. A newly formed kind of training is needed out there, for sure.
Jasmine Eliav, Psychologist, Hospital for Sick Children-Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect (SCAN): That is partially why we developed this screening tool. We are hoping to do research now to help disseminate that across clinicians, so that it is on the radar and they are thinking about multiple forms of victimization. The kids who come up on our radar more are kids with multiple levels of victimization.
Jennifer Coolbear, Psychologist, Hospital for Sick Children-Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect (SCAN): Another unique thing is that many of our victims do not necessarily identify themselves. Due to the nature of the exploitation online, they do not initially identify themselves as victims. Sometimes police or law enforcement are identifying victims who have not disclosed. It has been unique for us to work with children and families where they may not have been the ones who brought the information forward. However, the information has been discovered by law enforcement without the child or family making that information available to us.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator Mitchell: Mr. Eisen, I would like to pursue the breadth of the application of this program at this point. You said 40 police forces in Canada, and I am sure that covers most of the big ones. Why would the other ones, however many there are of whatever significance, not be part of that? Is it a question of money?
Mr. Eisen: It is simply a question of resources, either money or people. For example, many of the smaller police forces do not have anyone who is specifically assigned to child protection. They do not have the person power or the funding.
Senator Mitchell: You mentioned that Microsoft provides the application. However, who provides the training?
Mr. Eisen: There are several components. There is the infrastructure — the hardware, if you want to call it that — which is typically provided by the law enforcement agency. There is the Microsoft back end, and then there is the application itself. There is also the related training.
Microsoft provides the application and, typically, it provides the training. In addition, we have a consultant who is on call, so to speak, to help people with problems they cannot work out on their own.
Senator Mitchell: Thank you.
My next question is to the Hospital for Sick Children group. I wonder whether you could give me an assessment. You have mentioned police and resources. In your experience in Toronto, what is your sense of the adequacy of resources the police department has for this kind of matter?
Of course, that is only part of it, and there is the question of services to people who have been abused and exploited in this way. What is your sense of the adequacy of resources to support and help them?
Ms. Smith: In general, the resources are minimal. Hearing daily from my law enforcement colleagues, they obviously can work only on the cases that they physically can handle. However, there are so many more cases out there. I think the resources are not as good as they could be, and that is financially driven.
In terms of services for victims, I think our children's mental health services, in general, are fairly under-resourced. When you add this new piece of Internet exploitation to the system, you are adding a whole new area to a system that is already under-resourced and under-serviced.
I think the strain will become fairly intense. In our small program, we are seeing an increase in the workload when we are given a certain amount of money to provide a certain mandate. Now, we are adding on top of the workload this piece that was not on the radar five years ago but is becoming more and more of a significant issue for us.
From a law enforcement point of view and from a victim point of view, finances and resources are lacking.
Ms. Coolbear: Many of our families are on a waiting list for services for a tremendous amount of time. It is difficult. We are a small program and we see a certain number of families that we refer out to other agencies. Children and families will sit on a waiting list for resources for quite some time before they are able to access services.
Senator Mitchell: Ms. Yapety, who paid for the 25,000 presentations you have made to teenagers across Quebec? Is that Videotron?
Ms. Yapety: Yes, it is 100 per cent sponsored by Videotron. The schools do not have to pay.
Senator Mitchell: There are a number of web companies, all of whom should have some sense of responsibility and obligation in this matter. Are other web companies funding this kind of initiative? Clearly, Microsoft has made a commitment to assist.
If not, or even if so, is there a potential for some kind of collaboration amongst web companies? Clearly, one would think they would feel the sense of obligation to deal with this problem that Videotron has.
Ms. Yapety: There is already some collaboration. You can see different programs. There is a campaign in Quebec called Je protège mon identité sur Internet, which is sponsored by the Government of Quebec. It has a number of partners, technology companies and otherwise, who participate and fund the program so we can reach a larger number of people. However, this campaign has a different target; it does not target teenagers but rather the adult population as a whole. We have been participating in this one.
There are a number of initiatives where different companies are joining forces. We looked at each of them, but for what we wanted to do in Quebec, it was best for us to start our own program and build it according to what we saw in our market.
There are different ways for companies to collaborate. You are right: if we put our forces together, it is easier to get results. That is why I said not enough is being done right now and we are always looking for ways to do better.
Senator Mitchell: Mr. Eisen, I think you said we should provide guidance to the world, or that Canada certainly should or Canadians who are doing this should. You have made progress; nine countries is not insignificant.
However, is there some structured, institutional role that perhaps the Minister of Foreign Affairs could play — or is it being done? Where could the leadership come from? It is not only because there are some altruistic reasons to do this — it is a positive thing to do for other people in the world — but also these links are international and it would benefit Canadians as well.
Mr. Eisen: I think the Canadian government could demonstrate great leadership in getting the international network off the ground. There will not be an international network until the various countries that have deployed CETS can hammer out the appropriate arrangements for information sharing. There will be all sorts of privacy and security concerns, and there will probably be a level of distrust, which unfortunately cannot be avoided.
I would suggest that perhaps if the Canadian government were to evangelize the benefit to be secured by forming an international network — even if, for example, the start of the network was in Canada and the U.K., where we have historical, cultural and other ties — that would be a tremendous step in the direction of creating a truly international network. It would result in information being shared not only across the Canadian provinces, but between Canada and the U.K., in the first instance, and hopefully between Canada and all of these other countries ultimately.
Senator Mitchell: Would Microsoft be happy to help in working out the technical details of all of that?
Mr. Eisen: We would certainly be more than willing to see if we can assist.
[Translation]
Senator Brazeau: First of all, I would like to congratulate you on your program and on your campaign, which appears to have been successful. Using well-known personalities that young persons in particular can identify with was certainly a contributing factor to your success.
Have you approached the Government of Quebec to inquire about the possibility of establishing a partnership with it to bring this program to all of the province's schools?
Ms. Yapety: We decided to do the opposite, that is to develop the program and then offer it the Department of Education. Obtaining departmental approval is a slow process, so we preferred to develop and launch the program with the help of the schools, and then speak to the department.
Senator Brazeau: And have you heard back from the department?
Ms. Yapety: Not yet. We are in the process of reworking the program. Once that is done, we will contact them.
Senator Dallaire: Ms. Yapety, I have to wonder why other groups besides your company are not taking on this social responsibility. Social workers go into the schools and also work out of CLSCs. Why have they not tried to forge a partnership with you, the industry representative, given that they also work in schools on an ongoing basis?
Besides, you are not always in a position to go back to the schools every year. Are you planning to do so in the future?
Ms. Yapety: We have forged an alliance with Tel-Jeunes, since this agency has skilled individuals, social workers, psychologists and sexologists to meet the needs of young persons. We realized that not only could this organization work with young persons, it could also advertise a great deal so that youths know which number to call and who to call.
Senator Dallaire: This is an informal partnership. Do you have any plans to establish a similar partnership with all CLSCs and to include them in your program, or do you intend to adopt the same approach as you did with Tel-Jeunes, that is work on your own to get other NGOs to join you?
Ms. Yapety: We did indeed go it alone with Tel-Jeunes. As you mentioned, we try to reach every school. Each year brings a new crop of students and the process begins anew.
Senator Dallaire: Does your budget enable you to carry out many activities, or are your funds limited?
Ms. Yapety: We operate with a limited annual budget. We use the funds at our disposal to reach out to all of the schools. Our program enables us to work with 700 high schools in Quebec.
[English]
Senator Dallaire: Mr. Eisen, in your experience with your background with your firm and the industry, when people set up these child pornography sites and so on, is it done for money or is it done for other reasons? Is there a way of attacking the reasons, if it is not just money? Is there some way censorship could be formally structured within the Internet?
Mr. Eisen: Yes, with the disclaimer that I am not a law enforcement expert. In my experience, there are a variety of reasons for the creation of these sites. A number of them are for commercial purposes. A number of them are simply to create a communications vehicle for communities of predators. There is that wide range of explanations.
Senator Dallaire: Technology-wise, is bringing in a censorship board in the future a possibility for governments, including law enforcement, even in their own territory, or by web providers?
Mr. Eisen: Probably a solution that is more attractive to me, which is not to say it is the right solution, is for companies like Microsoft to provide various technology fixes, such as parental controls built into browsers and operating systems to protect children from getting to these places by ensuring that their computers will allow them to go only to places that parents find satisfactory. I think that is more likely than regulation to address the problem successfully.
Senator Dallaire: I was thinking more technology-wise. From a military point of view, we can jam anything. I am just wondering why your firm or other firms have not come up with the software to jam these entities and block that exploitation capability.
Mr. Eisen: I do not know the answer to your question. I think it is one thing to provide people with the tools to guide their children so they enjoy a safe Internet experience. It is another matter to start shutting off communication from the Internet. If you can be absolutely sure what you are shutting down, perhaps that might be an answer with appropriate judicial and other safeguards. Generally speaking, it is a disturbing proposition.
Senator Dallaire: We are continually getting a cop-out in our ability to impose a more draconian instrument that could, in fact, save lives. I agree with human rights and so on. I am the last one to not agree on that, but it seems to me that it is much easier to identify and close down.
Mr. Eisen: I agree there is no question we should be doing anything we can legally or technologically to address this threat. However, I am extremely nervous about doing so in a way that could lead to extremely serious abuse of and a lot of collateral damage in freedom of speech, privacy, et cetera. I am not defending these people by any means, but like many law enforcement issues, it is so difficult to strike the right balance between responding to the threat and ensuring that in the course of doing so you do not create a totalitarian situation.
Senator Dallaire: I am not totalitarian, but I am militaristic. A little discipline would not hurt.
Have you been supported in your efforts by competing industry colleagues?
Mr. Eisen: This is a Microsoft project.
Senator Dallaire: No one else has come to say they want to help you?
Mr. Eisen: I am sure that other companies are —
Senator Dallaire: Do not be bashful.
Mr. Eisen: This is something we are doing on our own.
Senator Dallaire: Ms. Eliav, your research pursues the links between theory and maltreatment, empirical findings and the practice of protecting children from harm. Is your research base limited to the Toronto area? Have you built a consortium of non-governmental organizations, NGOs, and government agencies working with you in this research?
Ms. Eliav: Our research initiatives have been small because of the numbers we are seeing. We are connected with a large research team in the United States that is trying to formalize more of a connection with the stakeholder team. They produce a lot of research on normative data.
We are looking at a high-risk sample. We need funding to support research to get a sense of what Canadian children are doing. What is normative Internet use? How many children are being approached on the Internet? What is the nature of that? We do not have much Canadian context to what is happening.
We are partnered with the University of Toronto. Ms. Coolbear and I have been working with the Faculty of Social Work to try to formalize more research initiatives. Part of the issue has been funding in this area.
Ms. Smith: We have good links provincially. Within Ontario, we work closely with law enforcement and victim services across Ontario. We are slowly starting to build relationships across the country.
Senator Jaffer: Ms. Coolbear, I am thinking back to when I practiced law. When a hospital was looking at child abuse, the abuser was usually, though not always, a person the child knew.
This is completely different. How have you made the switch? The age of the child is not as young. You probably work with older children.
Ms. Smith: It is definitely a switch. The dynamics are different, but similar. We see youth go online and meet people. They get to know them and interact with them. Then, something occurs.
It is a different dynamic. We have to understand better the relationships between youth and people they meet online. The social network that the Internet provides to these youth is different in many aspects but the same in others. They meet and develop a romantic relationship. They know the person and then something happens.
Our struggle is simply to understand better the dynamics of the social network to which our youth are being exposed. That is much of the challenge we have as clinicians. We are trying to get into the minds of youth and to figure out what they are doing online and where the risky behaviours exist.
Ms. Eliav: We are seeing younger children. However, with these children, we are finding that they are shown child sexual abuse images or adult pornography as a form of grooming them for sexual abuse purposes. We still see younger children as well, but the children being groomed and lured to meet online are typically 12 to 15 years old.
Ms. Coolbear: The purpose of our program is to develop an assessment approach through seeing these children and youth to address the issues we see for children victimized over the Internet. Our overriding purpose is to be able to disseminate that information to other clinicians working outside the hospital who also see that population of children and youth.
The Chair: We are 10 minutes over our time, Ms. Smith, Ms. Coolbear, Ms. Eliav, Mr. Eisen and Ms. Yapety. You have given us a lot of information and opened our horizons.
When we started our study, we understood that there would be a whole area of Internet stalking and exploitation, but I do not think we knew as much about it, nor did we know how much is being done by others. We are not the generation that was born with a mouse, but we hope that our report will be a benefit to public policy-makers who will be addressing these new issues facing young people.
I thank all of the witnesses for their indulgence in staying beyond the allocated time.
(The committee adjourned.)