Of particular concern is Clause 16 of the former Bill C-52 allowing security services unrestricted access to any device identification data from an ISP or other telecommunications service provider without a warrant. This will allow law enforcement to identify individuals involved in a striking array of online activity including anonymous political opinions made in blog posts or newspaper comments, location data posted online from a smart phone, social networking activity, private online instant message or email exchanges, and a host of currently unforeseeable future online interactions that are sure to come with new innovations and services. This unrestricted access to e-mail addresses will make it possible to track individuals across a vast range of online services, activities, and even locations.
Angus also points to the lack of oversight built into the bill:
Angus goes on to highlight the competitive implications of lawful access:
A final concern is the disproportionate impact some of Bill C-52’s requirements are likely to have on smaller ISPs and mobile service providers and, consequently, on their ability to compete in Canadian markets. Will smaller ISPs and mobile service providers be expected to meet the same standards for surveillance as large competitors? This legislation will impose added costs on equipment upgrades that smaller service providers will have difficulty meeting. The compensation for warrant-less information requests will burden small service providers with the obligation to respond to all manner of requests, spurious or otherwise.
The letter concludes with the key ask:
As none of these proposals have undergone parliamentary scrutiny, will you commit to ensuring that the Lawful Access” provisions of the omnibus crime bill will be set apart so they can undergo full review by Parliamentary committee?
This will allow law enforcement to identify individuals involved in a striking array of online activity including anonymous political opinions made in blog posts or newspaper comments, location data posted online from a smart phone, social networking activity, private online instant message or email exchanges, and a host of currently “unforeseeable future online interactions that are sure to come with new innovations and services. This unrestricted access to e-mail addresses will make it possible to track individuals across a vast range of online services, activities, and even locations.”
I think this is a list of what makes this legislation attractive to the current regime.
Here’s an interesting thought experiment …
We will train and hire a security officer to police the exit of every retail establishment in the country. By virtue of simply being in a store (municipal address) everyone will be searched, both inside and out, before they may exit. Certainly this will address the serious problem of physical theft and financial loss that is decimating the retail sector.
Isn’t that worth diluting our rights of privacy and reasonable grounds?
Anonymity tools
I have a feeling that projects like Tor will become a lot more useful outside of China and North Korea.
Putinization of Canada
So the Putinization of Canada begins. I wonder where Harper will build the gulag?
RE: Anonymity Tools
“I have a feeling that projects like Tor will become a lot more useful outside of China and North Korea.”
Agreed. Personally, I have both TOR and i2p installed on a test machine and have learned how to use proxies and VPNs to access the Internet, just so I know how to use them for when the time comes that they’re needed. I do very little which might be considered illegal, but I’ll be damned if I let the government track me at the behest of the **AAs.
I also see the purchase of foreign VPNs and proxies becoming very popular. I’ve also seen people, primarily Americans, who’ve used remote desktop types of applications and virtual machines set up in different countries. I’ve even seen those who set up full dark nets on top of the Internet.
All in the name of maintaining privacy. Such tactics will become very popular over the next few years.
Crockett – Not good enough, that’s too small scale. You’re only addressing physical theft and ignoring every other crime. What we need to do is have mandatory checkpoints on every single road where the trained security officers can pull each car over, gut it, search the occupants, log everything then let them go. Then half a km down the road it can happen again.
That is a fantastic letter and anyone who reading this post should read the letter as well. It sums up virtually all the problems with this bill, especially in regards to privacy and ridiculous powers granted to police.
This bill should be laughed out of Parliment for the very reason it in no way mentions the technical means with which this will all be accomplished. Will it introduce network latency? Is all this data being stored in-house or a central repository? Exactly what data will be stored? How will “securtiy forces” access this information? Are ISP employees with access to this data going to be bonded? Who is going to be responsible for data breach?
Nevermind the simple fact that the only certainty with a home network connection is that you can link it to a router and nothing more. There’s no way to link something from the “Lawful Access” bills with a specific computer in a home. More importantly there’s no way to be 100% certain that it was even a device that should be on that network. Ask anyone with networking knowledge or even do a quick search and you’ll find that a)unsecured wireless home routers are everywhere & b)it’s not exactly difficult to crack the encryption keys.
Ouch, bit long, sorry.
In a recent blog, I’ve raised the question on whether or not this legislation will in fact put our National Security at risk. Many former US intelligence officers have come forward on risks the Patriot Act can have on National Security. With a lot of critics focus on civil liberties, privacy etc (which are equally as important) effected by this legislation one important question still needs to be firmly answered by Government: Will this legislation make us safer?
I discuss here: http://bit.ly/juff96
Interesting and Possibly Helpful Bedfellows
So if the national security hawks and the civil liberty activists find themselves in agreement on this issue…yes, we will indeed have a problem should this “lawful access” bill go through.
@Carleton Grande
Another question that has to be brought to bare that I didn’t touch up on is the costs associated with such legislation. The US has spent billions in upgrading its capacity for this type of surveillance. Who will be paying for this type of upgrading here in Canada at a time of economic uncertainty and austerity? Lots of questions remain, and very little offered by Government officials. Where’s the value for money on this legislation? Can that be proven?
Theme Error with Two Browsers.
Here’s a test. Do you read your comments…?
I noticed a theme error on your page today. I even disabled all the script blocking that I usually have on. Then I checked it in chrome (which I keep plugin free to verify how things look). To summarize your category bar is wrapping around with the addition of “Wikileaks Canada Cables”…
I’ve uploaded a PNG to my wordpress site of how yours looked to me :).
http://blog.daveg.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/MichaelGeistOops.png
Lawfull Access is Unlawful
Microsoft May Add Eavesdropping To Skype
he U.S. Patent and Trademark Office published a Microsoft patent application that reaches back to December 2009 and describes “recording agents†to legally intercept VoIP phone calls.
The “Legal Intercept†patent application is one of Microsoft’s more elaborate and detailed patent papers, which is comprehensive enough to make you think twice about the use of VoIP audio and video communications. The document provides Microsoft’s idea about the nature, positioning and feature set of recording agents that silently record the communication between two or more parties. – by Kurt Bakke, ConceivablyTech — http://www.conceivablytech.com/8108/products/microsoft-may-add-eavesdropping-to-skype
Glad I have my own foreign proxy server – I don’t use it for everyday things, but if this goes through then I may as well. Just driving everyone deeper “underground”…
@ Joe
“Not good enough, that’s too small scale. You’re only addressing physical theft and ignoring every other crime. What we need to do is have mandatory checkpoints on every single road where the trained security officers can pull each car over, gut it, search the occupants, log everything then let them go. Then half a km down the road it can happen again.”
I hear the sarcasm here but is this not what is going on at every airport!?!
-guilty until proven innocent!-
The word has to get out…
I’m afraid just typing this but, we need to inform as many people as we can about what’s happening and how to elude it when it does happen. Any form of communication will be surveilled if they see fit. This is indeed going to be an absolute dictatorship. When the government can surveil everyone this means that they can also use that to further their own business interests, frame and arrest anyone that opposes or poses a threat to those business interests, undermine any opposition strategy and have them arrested, how do you think next election is going to swing, what do you think is going to happen to freedom of expression, what is going to happen to unions since all of their activities will be surveilled, and so much more as this will create an enormous domino effect in the dictatorship’s favour. It’s time to wake up and make the choice of whether you wish to be subjugated, or join the resistance.
What The Frell?
Isn’t this the kind of 3rd-world policing approach that Canada has criticized other “non-democratic” countries for? What happened to Section 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?
IPv6
I wonder how this will stand up against IPSec in IPv6
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Smart Home
I think you’ve made some truly interesting points. Not too many people would actually think about this the way you just did. I’m really impressed that there’s so much about this subject that’s been uncovered and you did it so well, with so much class. Good one you, man! Home Security
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