Canada’s Critical Infrastructure (CI)

Critical infrastructure (CI) refers to processes, systems, facilities, technologies, networks, assets and services essential to the health, safety, security or economic well-being of Canadians and the effective functioning of government. CI services operate ina complex web with connections within and across provinces, territories and national borders. For example, hospitals rely on electricity and clean water to function. Disruptions of CI could result in catastrophic loss of life, adverse economic effects and significant harm to public confidence.

The Government of Canada uses a risk-based approach for strengthening the resiliency of Canada's vital assets and systems such as our food supply, electricity grids, transportation, communications and public safety systems.

This includes the National Strategy for Critical Infrastructure, which establishes a collaborative, federal-provincial-territorial and private sector approach built around partnerships, risk management and information sharing and protection.

Enhancing Critical Infrastructure Resilience

Enhancing the resilience of CI can be achieved through a variety of security measures that address malicious and accidental incidents as well as natural disasters. Business continuity practices and emergency management planning are crucial to ensure minimal disruptions and the continuation of essential services.

Critical Infrastructure Partners

Strengthening the resilience of critical infrastructure (CI) requires collaborative work among many partners and stakeholders. Public Safety Canada works closely with other federal departments and agencies, provinces and territories, CI owners and operators, the research and development community and international counterparts to share information, manage risks and reduce CI vulnerabilities across 10 sectors:

Establishing trusted partnerships across the CI sectors is essential for strengthening Canadian CI resilience. By developing these partnerships, we are able to better serve CI owners and operators as well as the Canadian public.

Security Partners

Provinces and Territories

Five Eyes International Partners

Canada works closely with its international partners and allies to enhance the collective security and resilience of CI. Established in 2012, the Critical 5 (C5) is an international forum comprising members from the Five Eyes intelligence sharing network (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States). The Critical 5 aims to strengthen cooperation between member countries by addressing threats to CI, as well as to share information, practices and ideas on domestic policy and operational approaches to CI security and resilience.

In 2014, the Critical 5 published a shared narrative, Forging a Common Understanding for Critical Infrastructure. In the decade following its release, the geopolitical landscape has shifted, and the effects of climate change are being felt more readily. In 2024, the Critical 5 released Adapting to Evolving Threats: A Summary of Critical 5 Approaches to Critical Infrastructure Security and Resilience, which provides an update on the evolving risks facing CI and discusses how Critical 5 nations have been modernizing their approaches to CI protection. It also identifies common means to strengthen the security and resilience of their CI domestically, while recognizing the need for a collaborative and coordinated approach across the international community given the interconnected nature of CI.

Australia

United Kingdom

United States

New Zealand

CI Info Centre

Public Safety Canada maintains a collection of pertinent legislation, information products, and other resources for use by critical infrastructure (CI) partners and stakeholders to enhance or mature their CI resilience controls and programming.

Legislation: Authorities

Legislation: Obligations

Federal Strategies, Frameworks, and Action Plans

Additional Resources for CI

The links below point to other resources that may complement a CI organization's approach to strengthening their awareness and resilience in a dynamic and evolving all-hazard, all-threat CI landscape.

CI Talks: What is Critical Infrastructure?

Transcript

Hello and welcome to Critical Infrastructure Talks! You are probably wondering what is CI and why is it so important?

What is CI? Critical infrastructure refers to "processes, systems, facilities, technologies, networks, assets and essential services to the health, safety, security or economic well-being of Canadians and the effective functioning of government". There are 10 CI sectors that are identified by the Canadian Government that include Water, Safety, Health, Finance, Transportation, Energy and Utilities, Food, Manufacturing, Government and, Information and Communication Technology.

What does CI have to do with everyday life? Critical infrastructure involves most aspects of everything that Canadians experience during their daily activities. Such as turning on the lights when you wake up, opening your faucet to have a warm shower and jumping on the internet to do your online banking, which are all reliant of various CI sectors. The Government of Canada uses a risk-based approach for strengthening the resiliency of Canada's vital assets and systems such as our food supply, electricity grids, transportation, and public safety systems. Canada's Critical infrastructure uses this approach, recognizing that the actions required to mitigate the effects of emergencies are essentially the same, regardless of the nature of the event.

The risks are increasingly complex and frequent. They include natural, intentional and accidental hazards. Recent events illustrate the importance of protecting critical infrastructure from all types of hazards: flooding, ice storm, the terrorist attacks, power blackout, pandemic, hurricane, bombing etc. The risks and vulnerabilities are heightened by the complex system of interdependencies among critical infrastructure, which can lead to cascading effects expanding across borders and sectors.

Canada's National Strategy for Critical Infrastructure Document and supporting Action Plan establishes a collaborative federal, provincial, territorial approach to strengthening critical infrastructure resilience across ten critical infrastructure sectors. The Strategy promotes three strategic objectives: building trusted partnerships, protecting and sharing information, and implementing an all-hazards approach to risk management. Our branch is divided in 6 sections that support these strategic objectives. CI Partnerships, CI Exercises, CI Cyber Partnerships, Regional Risk Assessment Program, Virtual Risk Analysis cell and CI Policy.

What have we learned so far? CI can be interconnected and interdependent or stand-alone within and across provinces, territories and national borders and is vital to public and private life, all levels of government, corporations and individuals. Critical Infrastructure involves most aspects of everything that Canadians experience during their daily activities. For further information the Canada's National Strategy for Critical Infrastructure Document and supporting Action Plans explains these links.

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