Sandra Finley

2013-10-07 Spy agency CSEC needs MPs’ oversight, ex-director says, CBC News

Edward Snowden, Glenn Greenwald, Ladar Levison, Freedom of Speech. (Remove some wrong postings from category) No Responses »

Oct 072013

Please take time for the related ACTION ITEM:

2013-11-23 SIGN STATEMENT: Protect our Privacy! (IMPORTANT)

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FOLLOWING is a backup copy of the CBC Report. Go to the URL for pictures. etc:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/spy-agency-csec-needs-mps-oversight-ex-director-says-1.1928983

CBC gets inside look at super-secret intelligence agency at heart of Brazilian spying allegations

By Greg Weston

In an exclusive interview with CBC News, the former head of Canada’s most secretive intelligence agency says there should be greater parliamentary scrutiny of the clandestine spy service at the heart of Brazilian espionage allegations.

Calls for more openness are certain to get louder in the wake of fresh allegations the agency spied on Brazil’s mining and energy ministry in search of corporate secrets.

In a rare interview, former spymaster John Adams told CBC News he thinks the government must do more “to make Canadians more knowledgeable about what the intelligence agencies are trying to do on their behalf.”

Adams recently retired after seven years as head of the Communications Security Establishment Canada, and he admits the agency has deliberately kept Canadians in the dark about its operations for decades.

“There’s no question that CSEC is very, very biased towards the less the public knows the better, and in fact it seems to have worked, because you very seldom see them on the front page of the newspapers.”

Part of CSEC’s mandate is to monitor foreign communications, including those coming into Canada.

But it cannot target domestic telephone or email traffic.

“That’s against the law,” says Adams, who left the highly secretive Ottawa-based agency last year. “Absolutely not.”

But, he adds, “We have got capability that is unique to this country. No one else has it,” Adams said.

Warning for Canadians

Adams admits that CSEC is not immune from some of the practices causing a furor in the U.S. and Britain, but stresses they are all legal.

For instance, he says, CSEC is gathering huge amounts of so-called metadata from phone companies and internet providers, information on large numbers of people including their complete phone and email records.

“Metadata is an issue, there’s no doubt about it,” Adams says, “but they can only use what is relevant to ongoing investigations.”

American internet users are also up in arms over revelations that the NSA has been making deals with major telecommunications companies to get past the security encryption codes protecting customer data.

Adams won’t reveal details about how CSEC spies operate in this country, but they are apparently breaking through encryptions.

“The reality is encryption is ubiquitous, it’s everywhere, so clearly if intelligence agencies are going to seek information, they’re going to be able to breach encryption.”

All of which helps to explain Adams’s warning for average Canadians: if you think anything you read, write or send via the internet is private, think again.

“The reality is if you’re on the internet, you literally might as well be on the front page of the Globe and Mail,” Adams says.

“You have to know that probably if someone’s interested in you, they may well be listening or reading or whatever it might be.”

Don’t count on passwords for protection, either.

“If you use a word that’s in the dictionary, they’ll crack it in less than a minute.”

Adams says about 900 of CSEC’s roughly 2,000 employees are involved in the spy business, both gathering intelligence and analyzing it.

A lot are young, talented computer hackers.

“These young people … they’re computer scientists, they’re engineers, they’re just interested in the business. And they can do things with CSEC that if they did them outside of CSEC would frankly be against the law.”

Privacy commissioner concerned

Jennifer Stoddart, Canada’s privacy commissioner, is among those who worry Canadians are being kept in the dark about what goes on at CSEC.

“We don’t know enough about what CSEC does,” Stoddart said in an interview, adding that her office doesn’t have the authority to shine a light on CSEC.

The agency has its own watchdog, retired judge Robert Decary, who is stepping down for personal reasons at the end of the year.

Decary has a total staff of about a dozen people, only about half of whom are actual investigators.

Decary doesn’t give interviews, but Adams says CSEC processes more data in a day than all of Canada’s banks combined, so “obviously he doesn’t have the resources to look at everything.”

But Adams says the watchdog’s team does have access to enough key data to know whether CSEC is “doing something against the privacy law.”

In his final report to Parliament, Decary said he was unable in one instance to be able to determine if CSEC had broken the law, and he called for greater transparency.

Critics say Decary is not entirely independent, pointing out he reports to the defence minister, not Parliament, and even then his reports have to be vetted by CSEC for “national security reasons.”

As a result, Decary and his predecessors have produced reports that are rarely enlightening to the public.

Even Adams, the former CSEC director, says it’s time for the agency to be more open and report to a special all-party parliamentary committee.

That may come soon if CSEC continues to land in hot water over its foreign spying.

Allegations that CSEC spied on Brazil are just the latest.

Documents obtained by U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden and published in the British newspaper the Guardian in June suggest CSEC may have been part of a scheme to hack the phone calls and emails of ministers and diplomats at a G20 summit in London in 2009.

The leaked documents were apparently part of the intelligence debriefing after the summit, and those that made reference to spying on foreign diplomats included the CSEC’s official seal along with those of the NSA and the British spy service known as GCHQ.

Big Brother’s little brother

Thomas Drake, a former NSA intelligence executive turned American whistleblower, says the Canadian logo on the document is proof that CSEC was somehow involved in the London spying.

“The fact that their seal shows up on those slides means they are participants by virtue of that alone.”

Drake says the Canadian and American intelligence agencies have a close relationship, though the U.S. and British agencies generally call the shots because of the sheer size of their operations.

“You can assume that in terms of CSEC, that it is one of the little brothers of Big Brother NSA,” Drake says.

So CSEC is “generally going to go along with whatever NSA and GCHQ say. They are in partnership.”

CSE’s participation in spying at the London summit is now bound to raise questions about whether Canada spied on its own guests at the G20 summit the following year in Toronto.

2013-10-06 (UK) Cabinet was told nothing about GCHQ spying programmes, says Chris Huhne. Ex-minister says he was in ‘utter ignorance’ of Prism and Tempora. The Guardian

Edward Snowden, Glenn Greenwald, Ladar Levison, Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys No Responses »

Oct 062013

By Nick Hopkins and Matthew Taylor

GCHQ

Chris Huhne questions whether the Home Office deliberately misled parliament over the surveillance capabilities of GCHQ, pictured. Photograph: GCHQ/MoD/EPA

Cabinet ministers and members of the national security council were told nothing about the existence and scale of the vast data-gathering programmes run by British and American intelligence agencies, a former member of the government has revealed.

Chris Huhne, who was in the cabinet for two years until 2012, said ministers were in “utter ignorance” of the two biggest covert operations, Prism and Tempora. The former Liberal Democrat MP admitted he was shocked and mystified by the surveillance capabilities disclosed by the Guardian from files leaked by the whistleblower Edward Snowden.

“The revelations put a giant question mark into the middle of our surveillance state,” he said. “The state should not feel itself entitled to know, see and memorise everything that the private citizen communicates. The state is our servant.”

Writing in Monday’s Guardian, Huhne also questioned whether the Home Office had deliberately misled parliament about the need for the communications data bill when GCHQ, the government’s eavesdropping headquarters, already had remarkable and extensive snooping capabilities.

He said this lack of information and accountability showed “the supervisory arrangements for our intelligence services need as much updating as their bugging techniques”.

Over the past three months the Guardian has made a series of disclosures about the activities of GCHQ and its much bigger American counterpart, the National Security Agency. Two of the most significant programmes uncovered in the Snowden files were Prism, run by the NSA, and Tempora, which was set up by GCHQ. Between them, they allow the agencies to harvest, store and analyse data about millions of phone calls, emails and search engine queries.

As a cabinet minister and member of the national security council (NSC), Huhne said he would have expected to be told about these operations, particularly as they were relevant to proposed legislation.

“The cabinet was told nothing about GCHQ’s Tempora or its US counterpart, the NSA’s Prism, nor about their extraordinary capability to hoover up and store personal emails, voice contact, social networking activity and even internet searches.

“I was also on the national security council, attended by ministers and the heads of the Secret [Intelligence Service, MI6] and Security Service [MI5], GCHQ and the military. If anyone should have been briefed on Prism and Tempora, it should have been the NSC.

“I do not know whether the prime minister or the foreign secretary (who has oversight of GCHQ) were briefed, but the NSC was not. This lack of information, and therefore accountability, is a warning that the supervision of our intelligence services needs as much updating as their bugging techniques.”

Huhne said Prism and Tempora “put in the shade Tony Blair’s proposed ID cards, 90-day detention without trial and the abolition of jury trials”.

He added: “Throughout my time in parliament, the Home Office was trying to persuade politicians to invest in ‘upgrading’ Britain’s capability to recover data showing who is emailing and phoning whom. Yet this seems to be exactly what GCHQ was already doing. Was the Home Office trying to mislead?

“The Home Office was happy to allow the NSC and the cabinet – let alone parliament – to remain in utter ignorance of Prism/Tempora while deciding on the communications data bill.”

The draft bill would have given police and the security services access, without a warrant, to details of all online communication in the UK – such as the time, duration, originator and recipient, and the location of the device from which it was made. The legislation was eventually dropped after splits in the coalition.

Proper scrutiny of the intelligence agencies was vital, said Huhne, and surveillance techniques needed to be tempered. “Joseph Goebbels was simply wrong when he argued that ‘if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear’. Information is power, and the necessary consequence is that privacy is freedom. Only totalitarians pry absolutely.”

Huhne, formerly the energy and climate change minister, was jailed this year after he admitted perverting the course of justice over claims his ex-wife took speeding points for him. In February he was sentenced to eight months in prison but was released after serving 62 days.

His intervention comes as concern about the oversight and scrutiny of Britain’s spy agencies grows. While former members of the intelligence community insist GCHQ, MI5 and MI6 operate with integrity and within the law, even they have questioned whether the oversight regime is fit for purpose following the Snowden revelations.

Over the last few days a former member of parliament’s intelligence and security committee, Lord King, a former director of GCHQ, Sir David Omand, and a former director general of MI5, Dame Stella Rimington, have questioned whether the agencies need to be more transparent and accept more rigorous scrutiny of their work.

On Monday, a former legal director of MI5 and MI6 will add his weight to the calls for change. David Bickford told the Guardian Britain’s intelligence agencies should seek authority for secret operations from a judge rather than a minister because public unease about their surveillance techniques is at an all-time high.

Bickford said the government should pass responsibility to the courts because of widespread “dissatisfaction with the covert, intrusive powers of the UK intelligence and law enforcement agencies”.

“Whether this is based on perception or reality doesn’t really matter,” he said. “As long as government ministers continue to authorise the agencies’ eavesdropping, telephone and electronic surveillance, and informant approval, the public will believe that there is an unhealthy seamless relationship between them.” Bickford said it was time for ministers to “step out of the equation and leave the authorisation of these highly intrusive methods to the judiciary”.

Bickford was drafted in to MI5 and MI6 following a series of scandals, including the furore over the book Spycatcher, written by the senior former MI5 officer Peter Wright. He worked for almost a decade until 1995 and still advises governments on countering international organised crime and terrorist money laundering.

Bickford said giving judges rather than cabinet ministers responsibility for authorising sensitive operations would “reduce the risk of perception of collusion … and limit the room for accusations of political interference.”

“Government may argue that all this is unnecessary as there is adequate oversight of the agencies. However, that cannot substitute for independent judicial authority at the coal face.”

Meanwhile, on Sunday, the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) condemned the way the British government had threatened legal action against the Guardian newspaper unless it destroyed the copy of the Snowden files it had in London.

“WAN-IFRA calls on democratic governments to recognise that acts of intimidation and surveillance against the press risk undermining the fabric of transparent, accountable governance,” the organisation’s board said in a resolution issued during its meeting on the eve of this week’s World Publishing Expo in Berlin, Germany.

2013-09-28 Diane Francis’ plan to merge Canada and the United States has many, many problems, National Post

Corporatocracy or Democracy or Administrative State or WHAT? No Responses »

Oct 062013

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/09/28/jonathan-kay-diane-francis-plan-to-merge-canada-and-the-united-states-has-many-many-problems/

In her new book, National Post columnist Diane Francis makes the case for the U.S. and Canada forming a united North America

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Veteran National Post columnist Diane Francis has written 10 books. Merger of the Century: Why Canada and America Should Become One Country is easily her most ambitious.

Perhaps a little too ambitious, many readers might conclude.

———–….

Plus, what would happen to the CFL? Would we still be permitted to play with three downs?

‘We’ve been dating heavily for generations. So now let’s talk about common law — or even go all the way and get married’.

Moreover, trends in public opinion, especially here in Canada, would seem to go against the grain of Ms. Francis’ thesis. A decade ago, many Canadians were envious of America’s more-vibrant economy, and there was much talk of a “brain drain.” But since the 2008 financial crisis in particular, such talk largely has evaporated, as per-capita GDP levels have equalized between the two nations.

When I raise such concerns, Ms. Francis warns me that I am missing the big picture. In her book, she argues that a “new cold war” is being fought between the U.S.-led west and the Chinese-led east — a war that “divides the world into players who are open and those who are secretive.”

She believes that the increasing Chinese ownership of Canadian resource companies shows that we’re losing this struggle. (Indeed, much of the book is dedicated to raising awareness of Chinese “economic aggression” within Canada’s borders.) And unless we Canadians embrace a full-fledged union with the United States, she argues, we are destined to become “neo-colonial” vassals of Beijing, and victims of Russian gunboat diplomacy in the Arctic Ocean. In a dystopian scenario sketched out by military historian Jack Granatstein in the book’s first chapter, readers are presented with the dubious prospect of whole flotillas of “dope smugglers” and terrorists being ferried through our Arctic waters by Chinese ships.

On the day of our interview, there was fresh news that Ukraine had inked a deal with a Chinese company to lease a full 5% of its land mass to Chinese agricultural operations. When I ask Ms. Francis if this is the type of “neo-colonialist” scenario she fears might play out in Canada, she nods solemnly.

“Canadians aren’t talking about this threat,” she says. “We have a Prime Minister who has been taking some steps [in the Arctic], yes. But then you have the four opposition leaders. Three are from Quebec and that’s what they talk about. And then there’s [the Green Party’s Elizabeth May] from B.C. who wants to turn the country into a giant park. Meanwhile, the world is hungry for our resources. If we don’t develop them [with American help], it might all be taken away from us.”

“The bottom line,” Ms. Francis adds, “is that in this world, you need to be a big player. If Canada is going to be the target of a creeping takeover from a big player, we may as well manage the process, instead of being victimized. That’s what the book is about. For Canada and the United States, one plus one is going to equal four. We’ve been dating heavily for generations. So now let’s talk about common law — or even go all the way and get married.”

— Jonathan Kay is Managing Editor for Comment at the National Post, and a Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C.

2013-10-05 Canada’s Shadow Revenue Minister Warns Government against Sellout on FATCA, National Post

Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys No Responses »

Oct 062013

FATCA = Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (American)

Rain from heaven – – I think I am supposed to bless the universe at this moment! (And I do.)

For the trial I need citizens (and Judges) to see what is happening.
Audrey Tobias created a stir that brought more attention to the census and the role of the American military/surveillance through Lockheed Martin.
And now the information on FATCA is starting to get out (below).
Could not be better timing! The next critical date in the trial is this Thursday (Oct 10).

NOTE: Gil’s observations about Lockheed Martin and American access to Canadian data bases are in the Comments at the bottom of Lockheed Martin, War Economy, StatsCan, Census, Surveys, Charter Right Privacy, On Trial.

/Sandra

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FATCA increases surveillance capability by American powers.

It creates access by the NSA and other US “Security” agencies to foreign (and Canadian) bank, credit union and other institution records. It applies to individual accounts, but not corporate.

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American citizens are fighting FATCA (RepealFATCA.com).

Canadians, thankfully, are being drawn in. We would otherwise be unaware.

It is being raised in the Federal Government by NDP MP Murray Rankin (article below).

This comes around the same time as the release of financial analyst Diane Francis’ book , Merger of the Century: Why Canada and America Should Become One Country

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Canada’s Shadow Revenue Minister Warns Government against Sellout on FATCA

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Canada-s-Shadow-Revenue-Mi-by-James-Jatras-Canada-us-Integration-131005-282.html

James George Jatras for RepealFATCA.com

Washington, DC

At the top of the list of “must have” countries on which the U.S. Treasury Department needs to force submission to the “Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act” (FATCA) is our closest ally and biggest trading partner: Canada. Unless Ottawa agrees to sign on the dotted line to permit enforcement of this ill-conceived U.S. law against its own Canadian institutions and citizens, prospects for compelling the rest of the world to fall into line lose all credibility.

According to Treasury’s earlier expectations, Ottawa was to have knuckled under by the end of 2012. That didn’t happen , though the Department continues to make increasingly absurd and nonfactual claims that the world is stampeding to sign so-called “intergovernmental agreements” (IGAs) that enlist foreign governments as enforcers for the IRS. The first one to run up the white flag, unsurprisingly, was the United Kingdom, which has already finalized regulations that blatantly enforce this foreign (i.e., American) law on British institutions and citizens (” The International Tax Compliance (United States of America) Regulations 2013 “), at the cost of hundreds of millions if not billions of pounds — in return for nothing from the U.S . (Can anyone imagine Congress’s passing a law authorizing the Treasury Department to issue regulations on American firms and citizens to impost The International XYZ Compliance (China, France, Germany — take your pick ) Regulations 2013?)

In Ottawa, the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is under strong pressure to follow London’s poodle-like example . The problem is, Canada is a country that claims to respect the rule of law, including serious privacy and human rights safeguards , notably under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms . It is also a country in which a million Canadian citizens , perhaps even more, would be considered “U.S. Persons,” whose personal financial information would be sent to the IRS (and then over to U.S. intelligence agencies !) without even a suspicion of wrongdoing.

Standing Up for the Rights and Civil Liberties of Canadian Citizens and Residents

To be fair, Prime Minister Harper and Minister Flaherty are on record as objecting to FATCA in principle. But as with officials of other governments around the world, they have been subject to dire threats of sanctions from the Treasury Department, misguided pleas from some financial sectors that an IGA would lessen the negative impact of FATCA ( it won’t ), and a cheerleading section of tax lawyers, accountants, consultants, and software firms anticipating a compliance pig-out . This has seriously distorted Canadian officials’ awareness of their available options.

Now comes some serious counter-pressure from the Opposition, which may help clarify where Canada stands. While smaller parties like the Progressive Canadians (no representation yet in the House of Commons) and Greens (one Member, Elizabeth May ) have been commendably forthright in their resistance to FATCA, the major Opposition party, the New Democratic Party (NDP) , has been largely silent, or even passively supportive of FATCA in the mistaken belief it is merely a measure directed against American “tax cheats.”

The NDP still hasn’t come out against FATCA as such. But in a significant development, Murray Rankin , the NDP’s Official Opposition Critic for National Revenue, wrote to Minister Flaherty on September 25 laying out standards that must not be crossed in an IGA. (For denizens of the country south of the 49^th parallel who may not be familiar with Canada’s parliamentary system, the “Official Opposition Critic” is the equivalent of “Shadow Minister” in the British system — the Opposition Member of Parliament who would take over the designated Ministry if the NDP ” Shadow Cabinet ” replaces the Conservatives.)

In his letter, Rankin expresses “serious concerns” regarding Flaherty’s negotiations with Treasury to “oblige Canada to enact laws and regulations requiring Canadian financial institutions to comply with this U.S.-based legislation,” i.e., FATCA. He also cites the “lack of transparency” and consultation in the ” closed door negotiations. ” Exactly so. What is being hidden from not only the Opposition but from the public?

In addition,

“New Democrats are concerned with the prospect of a foreign nation unilaterally imposing obligations on Canadian banks to disclose personal information. The Canadian Government has a responsibility to protect Canada’s tax base, and while we understand the United States’ desire to protect their own tax base, this should not come at the cost of the rights of individuals residing in our own country. Cracking down on tax cheats should occur through international cooperation rather than unilateral action.

“What’s more, the secrecy of the negotiations over this agreement has left Canadians in the dark as to the integrity of their personal banking information. The Canadian government should be standing up for the civil liberties of Canadians. Furthermore, the Conservative government must ensure that any agreement reached is fair for Canada.

“In the interest of transparency, fair taxation and respect for privacy rights, we are asking the government to reject any agreement that violates the rights [of]Canadians or that fails to offer Canada equal benefits to those provided to the United States.” [emphasis added]

NOTE: the full text of the Rankin letter appears on the URL, starting at the bottom of page 2: http://www.opednews.com/articles/Canada-s-Shadow-Revenue-Mi-by-James-Jatras-Canada-us-Integration-131005-282.html]

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MORE BACKGROUND ON FATCA: http://www.opednews.com/articles/FATCA-a-Tool-of-the-Elect-by-James-Jatras-Economic_Electronic-Voting_Government_International-130928-983.html

2012-04-02 Privacy czar sounds alarm on drones patrolling U.S. border, Globe & Mail

Freedom of Speech. (Remove some wrong postings from category), Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys No Responses »

Oct 062013

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/privacy-czar-sounds-alarm-on-drones-patrolling-us-border/article2389782/

By COLIN FREEZE

With the so-called “Three Amigos” meeting in Washington, Ottawa’s privacy czar is expressing fears that unmanned aircraft could soon be peering down onto all three countries in North America.

“I think Canadians should be concerned about the increasing use of drones,” Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart told The Globe and Mail in an interview Monday.

“… It’s another technology that has the potential to be very privacy invasive. These drones could be going back and forth across the border and no one would notice.”

Ms. Stoddart made the remarks as she and her 13 counterparts in Canada’s provinces and territories released a joint statement urging the Conservative government to be more mindful of privacy rights as Ottawa and Washington firm up the language of the Beyond Borders agreement.

“I think this is really one of the big new implications in enhanced border security – the constant surveillance of our borders by drones or other unmanned vehicles,” Ms. Stoddart added.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who met Monday with Mexican President Felipe Calderon at the White House, announced the Beyond the Border plan last December. Now, officials in Ottawa and Washington are hoping to hammer out the fine-print details – including language on privacy-protection principles – by the end of May.

The overarching goal is to create a common security perimeter around Canada and the United States through shared intelligence and policing programs, initiatives that should curb Washington’s fears of cross-border terrorism and help meet both countries’ need for bilateral trade.

But Ms. Stoddart and her provincial counterparts are worried that the security perimeter could eat away at civil liberties.

There are few more glaring symbols of growing U.S. government surveillance power than the Predator drones that are migrating from foreign war zones to become unarmed eyes in the sky for domestic police and border guards.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security flies some drones over American air space along remote patches of the Canada-U.S. border – including one that stopped suspected cattle rustlers in North Dakota last year.

And last month, it was widely reported that U.S. drones were being secretly dispatched to Mexico to assist that country’s efforts to curb a bloody drug war that’s claimed thousands of lives.

Ottawa has been less eager to embrace drones for surveillance on civilians.

The Canadian Forces use some unmanned planes in foreign war zones and to patrol the coast and some domestic police forces have recently purchased “micro-drones” to help gather evidence at crime scenes.

But unlike their U.S. counterparts, Canada’s border guards are not known to be using any drones to keep an eye on land crossings. Should they start, or team up with U.S. border guards to do so, such measures could raise a litany of privacy questions.

“I haven’t heard nor has my staff heard that the Canada Border Service Agency has drones,” Ms. Stoddart said. “… But it’s a coming technology.”

Hammering out the right regulatory framework is key, she said, adding that her office is being consulted with “increased cadence” by federal officials as they try to firm up the Beyond the Border agreement .

Ms. Stoddart said she is also concerned about expanding programs that would allow U.S. police and federal agents to pursue investigations on Canadian soil by teaming up with Canadian counterpart agencies.

Such programs could lead to U.S. intelligence databases being populated with information gathered in Canada. And yet, red-flagged Canadians would have no legal recourse that would allow them to get misleading or wrong information scrubbed out American databases if need be.

“The clock is ticking,” Ms. Stoddart said. “… This is why we are coming out with a statement now because we are concerned about maintaining Canadian privacy standards, about not unnecessarily sending data to the United States.”

2013-10-04 SCC decision on leave-to-appeal will be delivered Thursday Oct 10

Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys 4 Responses »

Oct 052013

Sandra Finley v. Her Majesty the Queen

SCC File No.: 35431

. . . Further to a communication from the Supreme Court of Canada today, please be advised that the judgment in the above-referenced Leave to Appeal will be rendered at

9:45 a.m. on (Thursday) October 10,2013.

(Ontario time)

2013-10-04 89 years old, didn’t fill in census (Lockheed Martin); she’s in Court?! Audrey Tobias

Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys No Responses »

Oct 042013

Thank-you StatsCan, for selecting 89-year-old Audrey Tobias to prosecute! Way to go, Audrey!!

Lockheed Martin is becoming a household name in Canada. They and their evil deeds were little known in Canada 7 years ago.

Audrey Tobias did not fill in her 2011 Census form because of Lockheed Martin’s involvement. She’s on trial.

The Judge’s decision will be known October 9.

In the witness stand . . . Tobias explained she was a member of the Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service during the Second World War.

She became a committed peace activist after viewing movie footage of the war and the atomic bombing of Japan, and touring a desolate post-war Europe.

“I recall the great pain of that,” she said, as a court full of supporters watched.

I’ve appended links to some of the on-line news reports. And used their “comments” section to correct some of the misinformation – – my way of supporting Audrey in whatever way possible.

RE: (Excerpt from news story) In 2011, StatsCan received 13 million completed census forms, a 98 per cent response rate. Overall, it referred 54 people for prosecution for failing to complete the mandatory census form.

2% of 13 million is 260,000.

For previous censuses, StatsCan and the Justice Department have consistently referred 62 to 65 people for prosecution; 54 is a decline in the numbers prosecuted.

SOME OF THE NEWS REPORTS:

– http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/10/03/trial_begins_for_89yearold_who_wont_fill_out_census.html

– http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/10/03/audrey-tobias-census-fine-stephen-harper_n_4034723.html

– http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ww-ii-veteran-audrey-tobias-census-objector-in-court-1.1893927

– http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/10/03/toronto-peace-activist-89-defiant-ahead-of-trial-for-census-refusal-over-weapons-maker-link/

– http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/toronto-woman-89-pleads-not-guilty-in-census-protest-case-1.1481472

2013-10-03 Raucous trial for peace activist, 89, who refused to file census with links to U.S. weapons maker

Edward Snowden, Glenn Greenwald, Ladar Levison, Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys No Responses »

Oct 032013

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/10/03/trial_begins_for_89yearold_who_wont_fill_out_census.html#

Audrey Tobias was joined by about 80 supporters as her lawyer argued for her stand against the census software provided by Lockheed Martin.

By: Liam Casey

An 89-year-old woman believes she won her case for refusing to fill out her census form. But the judge will make his decision next Wednesday. Yet Audrey Tobias expects to lose.

“I think it went quite well and everyone listened to everyone nicely,” Tobias said afterward.

Added her lawyer, Peter Rosenthal: “It went very well, I thought. It’s a tough case, but she was able to express her opinion, so in that way we’ve won.”

At the heart of Tobias’ stand against the census is Lockheed Martin, the American weapons manufacturer who provided Statistics Canada with the software to process millions of forms.

Rosenthal argued that forcing Tobias to fill out the form would be against her Charter rights to freedom of expression and freedom of conscience.

Tobias also expressed concern about the security breaches revealed by Edward Snowden, who has explained how the U.S. National Security Agency used “back doors” to access Americans’ telecommunications.

About 80 of Tobias’s friends packed the courtroom on the second floor of Old City Hall Thursday, many of them retired. The overflowing courtroom had some sitting in the prisoner’s box.

When Crown attorney Maria Gaspar stood up to read the agreed statement of facts, the courtroom erupted.

“Please speak up,” one man shouted.

“Louder,” yelled an older woman.

“There’s a lot of seniors here,” another man said, fiddling with his hearing aid.

Once the microphones were working, Yves Beland — the director of census operations, and the Crown’s only witness — explained the security of StatsCan’s network. The data, he said, is maintained on a secure network with “no connection to the outside world.”

He detailed the minutiae surrounding how people log in to the Internet to fill out the census form. Just as he was about to explain how the paper form and telephone census worked, Justice Ramez Khawly cut him off.

“Do we have to go through this?”

He explained the security of Statistics Canada’s census network.

“There have been no breaches of the 2006 and 2011 census data,” Beland told court, referring to both censuses processed with Lockheed Martin’s software.

The census has a 98 per cent response rate and about 330 refusals, of which 54 are being prosecuted, Beland said.

He said that a few companies bid on the 2006 census, which Lockheed won. The American company was the only company to bid on the 2011 census, primarily because Statistics Canada had such specific requests to update the software Lockheed built for them earlier that they were the only company that even qualified.

On cross-examination, Rosenthal asked if Beland had ever heard of Edward Snowden.

“No,” Beland said.

Beland said Statistics Canada hired hackers to try to break into its own system, but were unable to. He also said it hired companies to monitor the code that Lockheed Martin provided for any suspicious activities, of which, he said, there were none.

“That you know of,” asked Rosenthal.

“Yes,” Beland said.

Then Rosenthal called Tobias to the stand. Everyone clapped, with the odd “Woot!”

“Listen, I run a pretty loose courtroom, but this is not a movie,” Justice Ramez Khawly said with a big grin. Everyone laughed.

Tobias has said she has no problem with the census itself, but takes issue with how the information is processed. She spoke of her lengthy involvement against military action, which dates back to her involvement in the Second World War.

“I would like our country to be peaceful,” Tobias told court. “Giving (the contract) to a military company sends a message that we support military solutions.”

She had the courtroom laughing on several occasions. Rosenthal asked her to explain how she became a peace activist.

“Well, it won’t be brief,” she said.

And, when asked her age: “I’m 89 — I’ve seen better days.”

Rosenthal also called Arcady Genkin, who helps protect the University of Toronto’s networks. The judge and Crown had issues with Genkin, since he wasn’t an official “expert,” which limited his testimony to the university’s network and meant he was not able to give a opinion on Statistics Canada’s.

“It sounds like they are doing what they should be doing, but those are precautionary measures,” Genkin said. “There are no guarantees for any network. They all have vulnerabilities.”

It’s a sentiment that a security expert echoed when speaking with the Star Thursday.

“There is no such thing as a secure network,” said Christian Leuprecht, a professor at Queen’s University and the Royal Military College of Canada. “But you are taking a far greater security risk with your phone than you are with Lockheed Martin or StatsCan.”

Rosenthal said Lockheed Martin could, in theory, build a backdoor and access the census data. Under the U.S. Patriot Act, the Federal Bureau of Investigation can demand American companies hand over their data, regardless of where it comes from.

But even in the age of NSA snooping on companies like Google and Microsoft, there is simply too much at stake for both Lockheed and the Canadian government.

“For one, if the census data were ever hacked, no one would ever fill out a census again,” Leuprecht said.

Rosenthal also had a lengthy tête-à-tête with the judge about the finer details of freedom of expression.

“The question is, how does this really affect Ms Tobias should it get out?” the judge asked, adding that the short-form census doesn’t have much besides her basic personal information.

“Where do you draw the line?” the judge asked, seemingly leaning toward the Crown’s argument that this doesn’t violate her freedom of expression.

“There isn’t much case law supporting Mr. Rosenthal’s client.”

The judge will give his decision on Oct. 9.

Tobias left the court exhausted, but pleased. And off she went for a late afternoon dinner across the street.

2013-10-01 Canada’s elite soldiers expropriate to expand CFB Trenton, Maclean’s Magazine

Economy / Political Economy, Freedom of Speech. (Remove some wrong postings from category), Peace or Violence 1 Response »

Oct 012013

The words out-of-the-mouth of the MP who defends the expropriation and expansion of CFB Trenton is in the video at the bottom of the article – see the URL. http://www2.macleans.ca/2013/10/01/85-year-old-farmer-loses-land-battle-though-military-grants-him-one-last-harvest/

(I copied the Text of the article below for backup purposes.)

Member-of-Parliament Rick Norluck’s argument is the one used by the War Corporations in the U.S. (I wonder who scripted it for him.) It is an unsound economic argument, easily refuted.

Rick Norluck, MP for Northumberland-Quinte West parrots:

” . . . It’s good for the area . . . It is in the national interest that we proceed with this. The vast majority .. want this to go ahead sooner .. because they know the economic implications. This means a lot to this community. This is about jobs and family’s incomes and economic development.. .”

IT IS A BOGUS ARGUMENT:

What happens when you invest in wheat? . . . you develop an economy based on wheat (grain production).

What happens when you invest in the tar sands? . . . you develop an economy based on petroleum. If the amount of money invested is huge, other industries are starved of investment (the Ontario manufacturing base).

What happens when you invest in War? Your economy becomes dependent upon war.

What happens when you invest in destructive industries – – the only jobs available to young people are jobs that kill either the environment, or people, or both.

The farmer at the heart of the expropriation, Frank Meyers, understands what the First Nations people know: take away people’s ability to feed themselves, you make them dependent and impoverished.

What happens when you invest in solving the problems of our society – – we’ll never know because we keep sending our taxes and pension money for investment in the industries that create destruction and waste resources.

Let Rick Norluck know. His contact info: http://www.parl.gc.ca/MembersOfParliament/ProfileMP.aspx?Key=170175

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

http://www2.macleans.ca/2013/10/01/85-year-old-farmer-loses-land-battle-though-military-grants-him-one-last-harvest/

Farmer loses land battle, though military grants him one last harvest

Fighting to save his beloved farm from Canada’s elite soldiers, Frank Meyers is finally forced to surrender

by Michael Friscolanti

In Frank Meyers’s eyes, the view from his dining room window is priceless. Literally. He can see the old wooden house where he lived as a little boy. The family barn, rebuilt with his talented hands. Rows and rows of sweet corn, sprouting from prime Ontario soil. No matter how many federal bureaucrats knocked on his door—or how much cash they offered to pay—the 85-year-old farmer refused, again and again, to sell his beloved land. As he likes to say: “You can’t eat the money.”

But as Frank Meyers learned today—in a heartbreaking moment he’d been dreading for years—you can’t stop the government, either. If the feds want your property (in his case, to build a state-of-the-art training ground for the Canadian military’s elite special forces commandos), fighting back is futile. “In other countries, they’re crushing you with bullets and guns and ammunition and tanks and explosives,” Meyers says. “Not in Canada. It’s pencil and paper here, and then they’ve got control.”

A senior military officer from CFB Trenton—joined, just in case, by members of the Ontario Provincial Police—visited the Meyers farm Tuesday morning to explain the inevitable next step. Effective immediately, for the first time in his life, Meyers has no legal right to step foot on “his” property. First thing Wednesday morning, the Department of National Defence will erect “No Trespassing” signs around the fence line, as contractors begin preliminary work on what will become the new headquarters of Joint Task Force 2. (Those “No Trespassing” signs would have gone up today, a military spokesman says, but the base is doing everything it can to be “sensitive” to Frank Meyers. “We are concerned about his emotions,” says Captain Christopher Daniel. “His condition is our top priority. We want to make sure he’s okay.”)

Meyers, of course, will never be okay. For a man who knows every square centimetre of his farm—and the rich history that defines it—today’s news could not be more devastating. “I’m going on 86 years old, and they’re harassing a man like me?” he says. “I haven’t done anything wrong and I’m not doing anything wrong. They’re just mad at me because I didn’t roll over and say: ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes.’ ”

Since the Harper Conservatives were first elected in 2006, they have proclaimed their plans to bring a specialized army unit to CFB Trenton, the country’s largest and busiest air force base. In 2009, Ottawa revealed that the incoming unit would be none other than JTF 2, Canada’s top-secret special forces squad, currently based on the outskirts of Ottawa. The move is the highlight of a massive base expansion project that will inject millions of dollars into the local economy (not to mention hundreds of heavily trained counterterrorism troops).

But as Maclean’s first reported, the plan didn’t sit well with a few local landowners, whose properties—unbeknownst to them—had been selected for JTF 2’s new 400-hectare home. “Our world has been crushed,” one owner said at the time. “Somebody somewhere has decided they want to move JTF 2, but did they ever take into consideration what that was going to do to other people? They drew a red line around these pieces of property, and ever since then everybody in there has been screwed.”

Angry or not, the 12 landowners were left with only two real options: sell now, or be expropriated later. One by one, they agreed to sell—until there was just one holdout left: Frank Meyers.

When the government officially filed expropriation papers in February 2012, the Meyers family hired a lawyer and launched their only available appeal: an objection in front of an independent hearings officer. Their central argument was that the military had more than enough land to extend the base, and the Meyers’ 90 hectares weren’t necessary to complete the project. They also trumpeted the historical significance of the farm: the direct descendant of Capt. John Walden Meyers, a Loyalist war hero and founder of nearby Belleville, Ont., Frank Meyers farmed a portion of the very same plot of land King George III awarded to his legendary forefather for his service during the American Revolution. As Frank Meyers has said many times: “This property didn’t come from the Canadian government, it came from the British government. So if the Queen wants it, let her come and see me.”

The Harper government was unmoved. After reading the hearing officer’s report in May 2012, then-Public Works Minister Rona Ambrose declared the Meyers land “absolutely essential for the safety and security of Canada” and rubberstamped the expropriation papers. The final selling price was the only thing left to negotiate.

But in the 17 months since, Frank Meyers has refused repeated offers from the government. He did sign a licensing agreement that allowed him to continue farming the property while he removed his belongings, but when that deal expired at midnight on Monday, the government refused to extend it. Nearly seven years after his fight began—and more than two centuries after his family first moved to the farm—Meyers has no choice but to finally surrender. “Without enough public support, I don’t think there is anything more we can do,” says John Meyers, Frank’s son. “It is difficult to know that you’re losing everything you’ve got. You try to remain optimistic that things will work out, but you just don’t know.”

Technically, the Meyers are not completely banned from the farm. Not yet, at least. Col. David Lowthian, the new wing commander at CFB Trenton, has ordered his staff to be as accommodating as possible as the Meyers adjust to their new reality. For the next month, they will be allowed to enter the property during the day to continue removing their belongings (as long as they notify the base in advance), and when the corn is ready, they can also request permission to harvest their crop one final time. “Throughout the process we have remained respectful and non-confrontational with Mr. Meyers,” says Daniel, the base spokesman. “That is what we have been doing, and that’s what we’ll continue doing.”

John Meyers admits that DND has been “fair” with his family. The department of public works is completely different story, he says, as they continue to haggle over the final selling price, including moving costs. (The Meyers house, and a small piece of surrounding land, were spared from expropriation). But whatever the final result, whatever the final selling price, one thing is certain: at some point, as winter settles in, the gates will be locked for good. And the view from Frank’s front window, a source of pride for so many decades, will be a painful sight to see.

Census Lockheed Martin Trial: The Supreme Court Documents

Privacy of Personal Information; Charter Right; Surveillance; StatsCan Censuses & Surveys 1 Response »

Sep 302013

Note: Italicized bold underlined text is a link

Re: seeking leave-to-appeal to the SCC (Supreme Court of Canada), R v Finley

1. SCC Objective Summary Sep2013

As at Sept 30, 2013,

this two-paragraph Summary of the issue in my trial has the potential to decide whether we have the Charter Right to Privacy of personal information, or not.

2. MY RESPONSE TO THE SUMMARY

The Summary is misleading. The reasons why are in To lawyer re SCC Objective Summary.

Lawyer Steve responded:

– The way I understand it, this is an ongoing process.

– I have contacted the SCC to see whether we can get the summary changed.

– – – – – – – – – –

The Objective Summary was prepared by a lawyer who works for the Supreme Court.

It will be given to the Panel of 3 Justices to aid their decision whether leave-to-appeal in my case, R vs Finley, is granted.

3. SCC Referral to Panel Sep2013

Names the 3 Justices who will decide whether leave-to-appeal is granted. One of them is Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin for whom I have respect, we’ve referred to her work in a number of postings (for years she has been telling the Judges and Lawyers that they have to reform the Justice system).

4. Canadian Law, the Charter Right to Privacy

Effectively, this will be lost, if I lose the court case:

“In fostering the underlying values of dignity, integrity and autonomy, it is fitting that s. 8 of the Charter should seek to protect a biographical core of personal information which individuals in a free and democratic society would wish to maintain and control from dissemination to the state.”

(I was found guilty of non-compliance with the Statistics Act; I did not fill in and return the 2006 Census Long Form with its 50+ questions, many of them personal. Lockheed Martin Corp (the American military) is involved in the StatsCan data base.)

5. It is more than the Charter Right. Please see “What is at Stake?” in

I need your critical thoughts! (Census Lockheed Martin, trial, appeal to Supreme Court).

It documents the intrustion into Canadian affairs of the American power elite and their desire to have access to personal records on Canadians.

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