Five Eyes, More Lies

Ottawa defends spy agency, says collection of Canadians' data 'incidental'

The federal government is defending its secretive eavesdropping agency in a lawsuit filed by a B.C. civil rights group, insisting any collection of Canadians' communication is unintentional.
The B.C. Civil Liberties Association filed a lawsuit last fall, alleging Canadians' communications were being illegally swept up by the Communications Security Establishment Canada, or CSEC.

The group's lawsuit targeted the spy agency's monitoring of foreign communications, as well as the collection of metadata, which reveals technical information but not the content of electronic communication.

But Ottawa has filed a statement of defence that says CSEC follows strict rules that prevent the agency from specifically targeting Canadians and its activities are monitored by an independent commissioner.

The government says it's impossible to know whether a foreign target may be communicating with someone in Canada, which means a "small" number of communications from Canadians has be collected.

As for the collection of metadata, the statement of defence says it plays a vital role in identifying and thwarting cyber threats.

Threats, threats, threats. It's all about threats, apparently. Except that Glenn Greenwald in December testified to an EU parliamentary committee that the NSA and the Five Eyes alliance (meaning CSEC) have a goal of the "elimination of privacy worldwide".

From the video:

"...the reason that I know that's what they're attempting to achieve is because this is what they say over and over and over again. On occasion they say it publicly, and repeatedly they say it in their private documents which were written when they thought nobody was able to hear what it was that they were saying."

Please watch his whole testimony.

Who do you believe?

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Richard Fantin is a self-taught software developer who has mostly throughout his career focused on financial applications and high frequency trading. He currently works for CenturyLink

Nazayh Zanidean is a Project Coordinator for a mid-sized construction contractor in Calgary, Alberta. He enjoys writing as a hobby on topics that include foreign policy, international human rights, security and systemic media bias.