Warrantless Domestic Spying In Canada: Fear, Secrets And Lies

(Updated below) (Update II) (Update III) (Update IV) (Update V) (Update VI) (Update VII) (Update VIII) (Update IX) (Update X)

Remember these questions that I asked?

I) To which extent is the privacy of Canadian citizens being illegally invaded, through indiscriminate sharing of private information and data, for the benefit of the FBI and CIA - in clear violation of our privacy of information laws?

II) To which extent Canadian citizens are being illegally spied and monitored, either by the RCMP, CSIS, the CSE, the FBI, the CIA or the NSA, in clear violation of our constitutional rights?

And last, but not least, III) Why is there not a single Canadian MSM journalist currently asking these questions?

Well, looks like things are beginning to come out, thanks to a slowly awakening MSM (emphasis mine):

Feds push for greater access to private info

Privacy watchdogs are crying foul over an attempt by the Public Safety Canada to come up with legislation that will force telecommunications providers to cough up personal information about their clients to authorities.

A consultation document obtained by CTV News reveals the government is planning to hold talks to "address the challenges faced by police, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the Competition Bureau when seeking timely access to basic Customer Name Address (CNA) information."

Due to a current lack of legislation, the document states, some telecommunications companies choose to provide customer information to police when it is requested, while others demand a court order before releasing any information at all.

The Public Safety Department hopes to establish new legislation to ensure police are granted the information on demand. That worries some privacy advocates.

And make no mistake: this is not just about "facilitating" the work of police (including the RCMP), but likewise for CSIS and the CSE.

Nevertheless: at last - sort of - some light is beginning to be shed on domestic spying in Canada.

Now, come on, MSM - keep at it and also take the extra step forward by daring to ask how much such information is (will be) shared with American securities agencies.

These questions are crucial, because - and regardless of claims to the contrary - the security agencies of Canada and the U.S.A. have been exposed not as seekers of truth, but as seekers of guilt.

And this altogether constitutes a drastically different game from the innocent until proven guilty one that we cherish so.

It appears that we Canadians are indeed riding fast down the same road to perdition with regards to our human rights, our civil liberties and our constitution, as the Americans.

All in the sacro-sanct name of Security.

Will we Canadians accept to have our private information freely given by companies and corporations to guilty-seeking Canadian and/or American security agencies?

I would hope not ...

Update: 09/13/2007 - CBCNews took on the story and added more (emphasis mine):

Government agencies are moving to gain access to telephone and internet customers' personal information without first getting a court order, according to a document obtained by CBCNews.ca that is raising privacy issues.

Public Safety Canada and Industry Canada have begun a consultation on how law enforcement and national security agencies can gain lawful access to customers' information. The information would include names, addresses, land and cellphone numbers, as well as additional mobile phone identification, such as a device serial number and a subscriber identity module (SIM) card number.

The consultation also seeks input on access to e-mail addresses and IP addresses (...).

The document says the objective of the consultation is to provide law enforcement and national security agencies with the ability to obtain the information while protecting the privacy of Canadians.

That last bit I consider pure B.S.. If one is so concerned about our privacy, then why seek to bypass the need for court-approved warrants, which need to be justified by probable cause?

Damn interesting question indeed (emphasis mine):

The document says that under current processes, enforcement agencies have been experiencing difficulties in gaining the information from telecommunications service providers, some of which have been demanding a court-issued warrant before turning over the data.

"Difficulties"? Difficulties? What - are they saying that due process makes their work difficult?

Translation: We want the information whenever we want, no questions asked. Trust us. Allow us to make our work easier and without accountability or safeguards, eh?

And therein lies the intellectual sloth-driven reasoning of the authoritarian mind. Case in point (emphasis mine):

"If the custodian of the information is not co-operative when a request for such information is made, law enforcement agencies may have no means to compel the production of information pertaining to the customer," the document says. "This poses a problem in some contexts."

Actually, this is what court-approved warrants are for, disassembling incompetents that they are.

Furthermore, we all know what they mean here by "some contexts", right?

"Suspected terrorists", of course. Especially since the mere suspicion is sufficient and probable cause, in their guilty-seeking, incompetent modus operandi.

Their sheer mendacity likewise knows no bounds, like the true incompetents that they are (emphasis mine):

(...) the process is not being conducted publicly as two previous consultations have been, in 2002 and in 2005.

The consultation has not been published in the Canada Gazette, where such documents are normally publicized, or on the agencies' websites.

Interested parties have been given until Sept. 27 to submit their comments, which is a short consultation time (...) Several organizations and individuals contacted by CBCNews.ca only received their documents this week.

More pointedly, a number of parties that took part in the previous consultations, including privacy and civil liberty advocates — and even some telecommunication service providers — have not been made aware of the discussion (...).

Officials with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association were not aware of the consultation.

(...) the other problem with the consultation is that it appears as if the government agencies have already made up their minds on how to proceed and are simply conducting it for appearances' sake.

Q.E.D.

Thankfully, having been caught with their pants down, the incompetents disassemble further but end up at least trying to do the right thing (to cover their sorry behinds) with regards to those consultations (emphasis mine):

(...) a spokeswoman for Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said the government was not trying to keep the consultation secret and would post the document on the internet on Thursday. The deadline for submissions would also be extended, although no decision on a date has been made yet.

Surprisingly, the National Post has an article on this as well. So does the Ottawa Citizen.

We better keep close watch on this, lest they attempt to pull another fast one.

Most damning of the Harper government's primitive mind-thinking and incompetence-driven need for expediency is the following (emphasis mine):

(...) a spokesman for the privacy commissioner of Canada said the government agencies have not yet proven that accessing information without a court order is necessary. The commissioner will be making a submission to the consultation on that matter.

And that is the point, isn't it?

I think it is high time that we remind our Mini Leader and his Harpie posse why exactly the need for court-approved warrants was instituted in the first place - you know, to prevent little "difficult" things on citizens like abuses, or unlawful searches and seizures, or even unlawful arrests.

Then again, why should we be surprised anymore by the intellectual sloth-driven ignorance of the Harper government with regards to democracy, civil rights and Canadian constitution 101?

We must draw the line once and for all - unless we really want to go the way of our neighbor south of the 49th.

Because even if Mini Leader and his Harpies desecrate our constitutional privacy laws by rewriting them in order render legal the access of private information without court-approved warrants, this doesn't mean that it is morally or ethically right - and therefore "acceptable".

As the MSM is slowly coming out of its slumber with regards to this constitutional travesty-in-the-making, is it up to us to keep a glaring spotlight on these consultations so that they remain in full MSM and public view.

Otherwise, the cancer on our body democratic will just keep on spreading further ...

Update II: 09/13/2007 - Other Canadian bloggers have begun to pick this up as well - here, here, and here.

Update III: 09/13/2007 - And three more bloggers join the fray here, here and here!

Update IV: 09/13/2007 - for the record, those three questions of mine outlined at the beginning of this post were first asked here, back in 08/10/2007. However, these three questions stemmed from an earlier one I asked here, back in 07/02/2007:

Considering the propensity of Harper and his Harpies in mimicking and integrating with the Bushies, and considering how said Bushies have no qualms about illegal surveillance operations on their own citizens, I find myself asking this dreadful question: to what extent has the Harper government been allowing similar illegal electronic surveillance on Canadians (presumably by the RCMP and CSIS), and to what extent is such data shared with the U.S.A.?

Let us keep asking those questions of vital importance to our privacy, civil liberties and constitutional rule of law! Even better: write about this to the newspapers and to your MPs. As I said already: we must draw the line - here and now.

Update V: 09/13/2007 - Two more bloggers here and here expose this travesty-in-the-making.

Update VI: 09/13/2007 - More bloggers jumping on this grave issue here, here, here and here.

Update VII: 09/13/2007 - And add one more of our fellow Canadian bloggers to the fray, here! I fervently hope that we altogether manage to awaken more of the still-slumbering MSM newspapers, magazines, radio and TV into awareness and action on this very serious and grave assault on our civil rights.

Update VIII: 09/14/2007 - Our Public Safety Minister, Stockwell Day, disassembles further with yet more double-talk: "We have not and we will not be proposing legislation to grant police the power to get information from internet companies without a warrant. That's never been a proposal". Oh, really? Why make consultations to this effect, then? Unless ... all these "freebie" powers to violate our privacy was meant only for CSIS or the CSE to begin with, as I've suspected all along (see above)? Now here's the clincher, Mr. Day: in what way whatsoever is such an attempt at seeking wide-ranging powers of (warrantless) domestic spying on Canadians, even if "only" for CSIS and/or the CSE, any more justifiable, let alone being constitutionally, ethically and morally right?

Enough with your lying and disassembling incompetence, Mr. Day.

And enough with your fear-driven surrendering to the terrorists.

We Canadians either stand up for our civil rights and therefore win against terror, or stand down in the name of Security and lose to terror.

It is as simple as that!

900 ft Jesus expands further on this here. Yet another take can be read here as well.

Update IX: 09/15/2007 - I missed on these blog posts on the subject at hand here, here, here, here, here and here.

Update X: 09/15/2005 - The whole idea behind seeking warrantless access of private information on citizens remains one borne out of incompetence-driven need for expediency and authoritarianism. Case in point:

The RCMP and other police organizations have been pressuring the federal government to make it easier for them to access personal information of customers, including name and address, from Internet providers as a way to assist investigations and help them quickly gather relevant information about potential suspects.

To this effect, allow me to reproduce again what Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said in response upon the emerging uproar with regards to his "consultations" in this matter:

"We have not and we will not be proposing legislation to grant police the power to get information from internet companies without a warrant. That's never been a proposal."

Consequently, I ask once again: why conduct consultations on potential changes that would make it easier for police and/or Canadian security agencies to get customers' personal information from Internet providers without a court order or other legal justification, to begin with?

Furthermore, why were such consultations initially kept behind closed doors, with only hand-picked participants allowed to contibute?

And we can pretty much guess who were those "priviledged ones" allowed to present their points of view behind closed doors, no? I am thinking the RCMP, CSIS and the CSE, for starters, along with perhaps one or two companies who actually have no qualms about providing private customer information on demand by authorities.

I also suspect one or two private security firms were allowed to chime in, especially considering that what they do is sell fear in order to sell the product that they provide: security measures counseling, logistics, systems and personnel. Case in point (emphasis mine):

Some security experts, however, remain in favour of giving enforcement officials more flexibility in accessing personal information.

Michael Murphy, Canadian vice-president and general manager of Symantec, said the time necessary to obtain a warrant often comes into conflict with the nature of internet crime, which can happen and spread quickly.

"It might work in the gumshoe days, but things are different now," said Murphy, who is consulting the government on the issue.

Things are different now.

How often have we heard this tired, fear-driven mantra in the aftermath of 9/11 and to this day?

As I wrote recently (emphasis added):

So - what exactly happened on the day after the fateful and tragic morning of 9/11?

We lost and the terrorists won.

Right there and then.

Whatever else has happened in the six years which followed to this day merely constitutes the gradual and methodical enactment of the terms of our surrender.

No more, no less.

What is now being sought with regards to warrantless access to our private information constitutes yet another fear-driven enactment of our surrender to terror.

As our American neighbors have done already.

And they were the ones who were attacked on that fateful morning of 9/11.

I shudder to think what would remain, if anything, of our own civil rights and liberties had we been the ones targeted on 9/11 ...

(Cross-posted from APOV)