The federal government takes cybersecurity threats to Canada’s space sector seriously, and is taking tangible steps to combat them. That was the message delivered by Dominic LeBlanc, Minister of Public Safety, Democratic Institutions and Intergovernmental Affairs, during his keynote speech at the Space Canada’s Horizons conference. He opened the last of three sessions of the one-day event, which was held at Ottawa’s Bayview Yards building on May 1, 2024.
Before tackling cybersecurity threats, LeBlanc took time to laud the creation of the new National Space Council, and the funding outlined in the recent federal budget. “On behalf of the Government of Canada, we look forward to working with all of you as we set up the new Space Council and ensure that it is as ambitious as it has to be to respond to the suggestions and the ideas that so many of you have shared with our government,” he said. “In the budget a couple of weeks ago, we decided as a government to continue to invest in that important work through a proposed $8.6 million investment in the Canadian Space Agency.”
It was then that Dominic LeBlanc turned to cybersecurity threats to the Canadian space sector. “Our open innovation ecosystem needs to be secure to ensure that sensitive research is conducted with trustworthy partners and that security measures are followed to protect sensitive technologies,” he said. “Canada’s reputation with our allies as a place to collaborate on cutting edge research and development depends on this very basic principle.”
To protect the Canadian space sector from cybersecurity threats, “we created Public Safety Canada, my department’s research security center, (which is) the first point of contact for Canadian researchers and universities who need support safeguarding their research,” said Leblanc. As well, “we implemented national security guidelines for research partnerships, which assess all academic research partnerships in terms of national security concerns. And through our new policy on sensitive technology research and affiliations, we instituted new eligibility criteria for grants from our federal granting agencies and the Canadian Foundation for Innovation. This policy prohibits funding for research proposals when any of the researchers are affiliated with or receive funding from a university, a research institute or laboratory on the list of named research organizations.”
Following LeBlanc, the final Horizons’ session included talks about Canadian Earth observation satellite projects, government space procurement, and Space Canada’s academic institution members’ projects. As well, one session focussed on Canada’s contributions to lunar exploration, including building a lunar utility vehicle to explore the Moon’s South Pole.
Building a Canadian lunar utility vehicle is a really big yet vague project, acknowledged Christian Lange, Executive Director of the CSA’s Lunar Exploration Program. This is why he asked space companies in the audience for help. “We do really need to work together to fix this, in terms of getting a solution that we can deliver on budget without a given or fixed timeline, and without basically exactly the known specifications of the rover, so that we can maximize the value of our Canadian contribution to the lunar architecture,” Lange said.