Beijing’s Wheels, Canada’s Blind Spot

As Ottawa rolls out the red carpet for cheap Chinese electric cars, Canadian experts warn these “spy machines on wheels” could become Beijing’s Trojan Horse parked in our driveways.

Story Snapshot

Internal federal memo admits Chinese-connected cars could help foreign adversaries track and watch Canadians.
China’s security laws can force companies to hand over location, video, and audio data gathered from Canadian roads.
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s EV quota deal trades auto-sector leverage and security risk for cheaper green cars and canola exports.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford and national security experts call these Chinese EVs “spy vehicles” and “spy machines on wheels.”

Carney’s EV Deal: Cheap Cars, Costly Vulnerabilities

Prime Minister Mark Carney quietly turned a former 100 percent tariff wall into an open gate by cutting duties on Chinese electric vehicles to about 6.1 percent and approving an annual quota that starts at 49,000 cars and climbs from there. This was sold as a clever trade swap: Canada gets canola access and cheaper entry-level EVs, while China gains a foothold in our market. But security experts warn those cars are not just “green vehicles.” They are always-online computers on wheels that watch where drivers go, what they pass, and even what they say inside the cabin. For a regime with a history of cyber espionage and repression, plugging thousands of its connected machines into Canadian roads looks less like normal trade and more like building a foreign sensor grid on our soil.^[1]^[14]^[20]

An internal Public Safety Canada memo, obtained by journalists, bluntly warns that data from connected vehicles “can have intelligence value” and that opening the market to “high-risk vendors” amplifies the exposure. Modern EVs constantly collect geolocation, camera feeds, microphone recordings, and detailed driving behaviour, then send this information back to manufacturers. When those manufacturers are Chinese firms, that stream does not stop at the factory gate. China’s national intelligence and cybersecurity laws require companies to help state security services, meaning any data they hold can become data Beijing holds. Security scholars argue this legal power turns every Chinese-built connected car abroad into a potential collection node for a hostile government that has already been caught hacking Western networks and stealing intellectual property.^[1]^[5]^[14]

‘Spy Machines on Wheels’: Warnings From Security Insiders

Former Canadian intelligence officers and diplomats have taken the unusual step of sounding the alarm in public hearings, calling Chinese EVs “spy machines on wheels” and “extraordinary sources of valuable data” for the People’s Republic of China. They explain that cameras and sensors can quietly log the licence plates of nearby vehicles, map routes around military bases or energy sites, and capture conversations inside the car. Because these platforms are software-defined and updated remotely, experts warn they could be manipulated at scale—bricked, tracked, or even used as access points into wider networks like the power grid and telecom systems. This concern is not science fiction; Western reviews of other Chinese-made infrastructure devices, like solar inverters, have found embedded components with the potential to disrupt ports and electrical grids. For national security planners, it is the combination that matters: compulsory data-sharing laws, opaque code, and thousands of rolling sensors tied to a rival authoritarian state.^[3]^[5]^[6]^[7]^[14]

Ontario Premier Doug Ford, hardly a stranger to the auto sector’s importance, has publicly labelled these imports “spy vehicles” and urged Canadians to boycott them. He points to the earlier decision to ban Huawei from telecom networks over backdoor fears and asks why similar caution is not applied to cars that now carry cameras, microphones, and constant connectivity. Cybersecurity experts such as David Shipley describe Chinese smart cars as “rolling spy vans” that can gather “huge amounts of sensitive data on North American drivers,” from biometric information to detailed travel patterns. At parliamentary committees, former intelligence officers add that China is already engaged in what they call “pre-positioning” in critical infrastructure to enable future disruption. Taken together, their message is simple and stark: Canada is building a foreign-controlled sensor and software layer into its transportation system without fully understanding how it could be used in a crisis.^[2]^[4]^[5]^[9]

Sleepwalking Into Beijing’s Arms While Allies Hit the Brakes

While the Carney government loosens tariffs and touts lower sticker prices, many allies are moving the other way. The United States is investigating Chinese “smart cars” for national security risks, with officials warning these vehicles are “like smartphones on wheels” that can be remotely manipulated and used to track Americans. Lawmakers there are pushing bipartisan bills that would ban or severely restrict Chinese-connected vehicles on U.S. roads. In Europe, regulators are exploring new cybersecurity rules and countervailing duties that treat Chinese EVs as high-risk because of the heavy use of cameras and sensors and Beijing’s tight oversight of manufacturers. Canadian experts say this global pattern shows governments are finally connecting the dots: once hostile states gain remote access to enough vehicles, they can watch, influence, or disrupt entire societies in ways old spy tools never allowed.^[1]^[16]^[18]^[19]^[21]

China's Trojan Horse Rolls Into @Canada: A National-Security Scholar, @ProfBShaffer, Warns @MarkJCarney's Chinese EV Deal Embeds Sabotage Risk in the Country's Roads, Ports and Grids. @scoopercooper #cdnpoli #Carney #Canada #China #EV

https://t.co/S5Npd6tehY

— fan of Blue Jays (@77BlueJays) June 27, 2026

Despite these alarms, key gaps remain in Canada’s response. The Privacy Commissioner has said he was not formally consulted on the specific risks of Chinese-made EVs, suggesting the government has not fully engaged independent watchdogs. Policy analysts note that connected-car data risks also exist in Western vehicles, but argue that is an argument for stronger data laws, not for inviting more foreign high-risk vendors. Security think tanks urge Ottawa to commission independent audits of Chinese EV software and force manufacturers to disclose whether they obey China’s data-sharing laws in practice. Until that happens, Canadians are being asked to trust verbal promises that these cars will not be used for spying, even as an official memo admits their data can help adversaries and experts warn we may be trading national security for a short-term green bargain. For American conservatives watching from across the border, the lesson is clear: keep those Trojan Horses on the other side of the line, and back a White House that treats data security, energy independence, and protection of critical infrastructure as non‑negotiable pillars of national strength.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4]^[14]