Everything is connected
Testifying before a parliamentary committee and speaking to reporters on Tuesday, February 3, 2026, foreign affairs deputy minister David Morrison and Nathalie Drouin, national security adviser to Prime Minister Mark Carney, said foreign adversaries are likely to use the increasingly popular artificial intelligence technology
The use of AI to disrupt the election could come from foreign actors or even those just trying to cause mischief.
Chinese authorities have instructed domestic companies to stop using cybersecurity software from the United States, Israel, and France due to national security concerns.
The blacklisted cybersecurity software is reportedly from Alphabet (Mandiant and Wiz), Broadcom (VMware), Cato Networks, Check Point Software Technologies, Claroty, CrowdStrike, CyberArk, Fortinet, Imperva, McAfee, Orca Security, Palo Alto Networks, Rapid7, Recorded Future, SentinelOne, and VMware.
Sources:
Reuters: Beijing tells Chinese firms to stop using US and Israeli cybersecurity software, sources say https://www.reuters.com/world/china/beijing-tells-chinese-firms-stop-using-us-israeli-cybersecurity-software-sources-2026-01-14/
Rithula Nisha Ebrahim, Cyber Magazine: Why has China Banned a Host of Major Cybersecurity Firms? https://cybermagazine.com/news/inside-chinas-ban-of-major-us-and-israeli-cyber-firms
Alan Jones, a former Assistant Director of Operations for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) discusses the threats Canada faces, intelligence sharing, and whether or not the US poses a threat to Canada now and the extent to which that might affect intelligence sharing between Canada and the US.
If the Trump administration continues to move in this direction, the global situation is more likely to descend into chaos or conflict than to achieve stable equilibrium.
Time:
The message is clear: Washington will throw its weight around in the Western Hemisphere and it wants rivals located elsewhere, China and Russia especially, out—or at least out of critical sectors. It’s a doctrine elaborated clearly in an otherwise muddled national security strategy. In a nod to old-school gunboat diplomacy, it rests on threats and acts of violence. At least part of the point of the smash-and-grab operation in Venezuela was to display raw military power.
A world divided into spheres of influence poses decisive new challenges to the sovereignty of the states inside them. Canada and Mexico will watch what happened in Venezuela and begin thinking the unthinkable. What if they have to defend themselves, not against Russia and China, but against their next-door neighbour?
The predators who promote spheres of influence promise us a more stable world: no more global policemen, no more universalist moral claims like human rights, warranting intrusion in the affairs of predators. Stability will be built henceforth on forthright moral relativism—what’s right for me is my business, what’s right for you is your business—and peace depends on armed deterrence in a law of the jungle.
In the world we’ve entered, weaker countries must learn self-reliance, resilience and guile to keep the predators at bay. A weak and divided Europe can’t continue to give America moral lessons, while trying to regulate America’s economic giants. Its entire rationale as a political project depends now on giving itself the capital markets to build their own economic strength and the military capability to defend themselves. Canada and Mexico must make a lot of new friends fast, establish new economic connections, and break down its internal barriers to an efficient and productive economy. If these middling powers face up to their own difficulties, a new multilateralism could take shape, brought into concert by their shared desire to hem in the power of the predators. If the middle powers band together, they might get through the 21st century with their sovereignties enhanced. If they go it alone or make the mistake of cozying up to one or other of the predators, they might find themselves swallowed up by one of the beasts.
Source: Michael Ignatieff’s Substack, January 4, 2026
The division of the world into spheres of influence implies that smaller countries cannot influence events, and it’s a grave mistake to imagine Venezuelans won’t try. Many of them wanted an American intervention, are overjoyed that Maduro is gone, and no wonder: He and his predecessor, Hugo Chávez, together turned the richest country in South America into the poorest, fortifying their ugly security state with guns and surveillance systems purchased from autocracies around the world.
But now that Maduro is gone, the people who fought for years for justice, freedom, and self-determination aren’t going to want to live in a Trump-backed dictatorship staffed with Maduro’s cronies. One Venezuelan exile, who requested anonymity because of risks to his family, told me that on Saturday, he felt like he was on a roller coaster. First the elation of Maduro’s exit, then the shock of Trump’s press conference, then the angry realization that maybe nothing has changed and he still can’t go home.
In a live New Year’s address, Taiwan President Lai Ching-te said the island is determined to defend its sovereignty and bolster its defence in the face of China’s growing assertiveness.
He urged opposition parties to support his proposal to increase Taiwan’s defence spending by C$55 billion (US$40 billion), a plan currently stalled amid a political deadlock in the opposition-controlled parliament.
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