Russia – NAOC

NATO’s Balancing Act: Deterring Russia Without Prompting Escalation

With rumblings that Russia might provoke neighbouring NATO member states, Zev Wood seeks to unravel Putin’s rationale and strategy. He argues that to counter potential military encroachments by Russia, Canada and NATO should remain steadfast in increasing deterrence posture, while simultaneously remaining aware of the potential blowback effects that accompany such a path. Using deterrence theory, Zev concludes that Canada should advocate for a strategy that combines credible deterrence and diplomatic off-ramps to reduce the potential for further escalation.

Society, Culture, and Security

Why Intangible Cultural Erasure is a Hard-Security Threat

In the occupied territories of Ukraine and across Russia’s own ethnic republics, President Vladimir Putin is executing a quiet war of attrition: banning native languages, shuttering local institutions, and sending minority youth to the frontlines as cannon fodder. This systematic campaign demonstrates that modern territorial expansion relies as much on eradicating living identity as it Read More…

NATO and Canada

Flags of Convenience: Russia’s Shadow Fleet and Canadian Maritime Security

Russia’s Shadow Fleet is more than a sanctions-enforcement issue. Despite the economic utility these intentionally ambiguous vessels present to Moscow, Jonah Moffatt argues its activities demonstrate how Russia has fused its economic, intelligence, and security interests into one overarching hybrid strategy. The increased prevalence of the shadow fleet in the Arctic requires Canada to not only recognize the security implications of this threat, but work towards a coordinated response strategy with its regional NATO allies.

Uncategorized

Twenty Years of Trust, One Day Without Guardrails: What Google Earth’s AI Integration Reveals About Emerging Information Threats

What happens when a trusted source of credible evidence becomes something just about anyone can fabricate? Google’s short-lived integration of its Nano Banana 2 image-generation technology into Google Earth offered a glimpse. Dorigen Gray examines how increasingly accessible generative AI tools lower the barriers to manipulating trusted sources of evidence, and what this means for verification, disinformation, public trust and national security.

Centre For Disinformation Studies

The Price of Shelter: How Canada’s Housing Crisis Fuels Disinformation

Canada’s housing crisis has made the public more susceptible to scapegoating and disinformation. Ji Young Kim examines how Russia’s Tenet Media operation exploited domestic culture wars, weakening societal resilience and undermining Canada’s reliability within NATO.

NATO and Canada

Behind the Northern Flank: Security Beyond Deterrence in the Canadian Arctic

The Arctic has become a key fixture of transatlantic security and Canada has taken significant steps to expand the securitization of the region. In his latest piece, Jonah Moffatt argues that security extends beyond deterrence in already vulnerable Northern communities, underscoring the necessity of investment with dual military and civilian outcomes. In doing so, Canada can lead NATO’s polar pivot by ensuring the homeland behind the flank benefits from the region’s growing strategic importance.

Society, Culture, and Security

‘Free?’ Alberta: Foreign Interference in Alberta’s Separatist Movement

In early 2026, researchers from the Canadian Digital Media Research Network noticed something odd. They discovered a network of at least twenty YouTube channels all promoting Alberta separatism and U.S. annexation in an eerily similar fashion. These channels all used the same template: thumbnails with fake pictures of Mark Carney and Danielle Smith, AI voiceovers, Read More…

Centre For Disinformation Studies

How Russian Disinformation Strengthens the Far Right: Doppelganger Campaigns and the 2024 European Parliament Elections

What happens when fake news looks almost identical to the real thing? This article highlights how Russia’s Doppelganger disinformation campaigns use cloned news websites to make disinformation appear credible and familiar. Focusing on the 2024 European Parliament elections as a case study, it shows how these campaigns exploit existing concerns such as immigration, economic insecurity, and support for Ukraine to amplify divisions within Europe. More broadly, it considers how these tactics could shape future elections, influence public debate, and make collective action across the European Union and NATO more difficult.

Kaya Dupuis Women in Security

Testimony as Justice: Ukrainian Women Documenting the Unthinkable

Ukrainian women-led organizations are building the evidentiary record for Russian wartime sexual violence, but are Canada and its NATO allies directing enough resources to the mechanisms that make accountability possible? In this article, Kaya Dupuis examines how organizations like La Strada-Ukraine and JurFem are documenting conflict-related sexual violence under active fire and what Canada’s commitments under NATO’s Women, Peace and Security agenda actually look like on the ground.

Centre For Disinformation Studies

Democracy and Disinformation, Part 3: The Cost of Comfort

Canada has the institutions, the reports, and the warnings about disinformation. What it lacks is a population that feels the threat. In this article, Dominique Arseneau-Bruneau looks at how Canada’s lack of urgency affects its response to disinformation through the lens of legality, legitimacy, and speed, and what the cost of that comfort may ultimately be.