By Barry Ellsworth
TRENTON
The electronic spy agency in Canada is intercepting and storing millions of emails from citizens each year, according to top-secret documents obtained from U.S. whistle-blower Edward Snowden that were made public Wednesday.
The document was written by Communications Security Establishment, or CSE, analysts and shows that the agency watches visits to government websites and intercepts and stores high volumes of emails, which could include such private items as tax returns and letters to Members of Parliament.
The document, obtained by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in partnership with the U.S.-based Internet news website The Intercept, is dated 2010 and its existence raises serious questions about government invasion and the privacy of individuals.
“…(Y)ou should be able to communicate with your government without the fear that what you say … could come back to haunt you in unexpected ways,” Chris Parsons told the CBC. Parsons is an Internet security expert with Citizen Lab, a Toronto-based Internet think tank.
“When we collect huge volumes, it’s not just used to track bad guys,” he said. “It goes into data stores for years or months at a time and then can be used at any point in the future.”
Parsons, who read the CSE document, cautioned that there are some legitimate reasons for the Internet intercepts, such as protecting government computers from hackers, criminals and other countries, as well as malware.
But the top-secret document calls into question the massive scope of the email snooping and the retention of the emails for such long periods.
Using a tool called PonyExpress, the CSE combed about 400,000 emails in 2010 and the volume would be much higher today, given the explosive growth of the Internet.
About 400 are tagged daily as suspect and the system sends those so identified to CSE analysts who scrutinize the emails and decide if they contain any potential threat.
“It’s pretty clear that there’s a very wide catchment of information coming into (CSE),” said Michael Vonn, policy director at the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association.
He said Canadians should be told about the agency’s collection of data.
“If we’re going to have trust that our agencies are acting responsibly, we need as much light shone on the architecture, the laws and the rules, as possible,” Vonn said.
Under Canadian law, the CSE is not allowed to monitor Canadians’ emails and phone calls, but it gets special exemption when it comes to protecting government IT infrastructure.
A CSE spokesperson told the CBC in a statement that the agency does eventually delete the intercepted and innocent emails but refused to comment on the amount collected or the length of time they are kept.
