Table Of ContentBig Data Surveillance and Security Intelligence
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Big Data Surveillance and Security Intelligence
The Canadian Case
Edited by David Lyon and David Murakami Wood
© UBC Press 2021
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior written permission of
the publisher.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: Big data surveillance and security intelligence : the Canadian case /
edited by David Lyon and David Murakami Wood.
Names: Lyon, David, editor. | Wood, David Murakami, editor.
Description: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200333143 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200333887 |
ISBN 9780774864176 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780774864190 (PDF) |
ISBN 9780774864206 (EPUB)
Subjects: LCSH: Electronic surveillance – Canada. | LCSH: Intelligence service – Canada. |
LCSH: Cyber intelligence (Computer security) – Canada. | LCSH: National security –
Canada. | LCSH: National security – International cooperation. | LCSH: Data
protection – Canada.
Classification: LCC JL86.I58 B54 2020 | DDC 327.1271—dc23
UBC Press gratefully acknowledges the financial support for our publishing program of
the Government of Canada (through the Canada Book Fund) and the British Columbia
Arts Council.
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Contents
List of Figures and Tables / viii
Preface / ix
List of Abbreviations / x
Introduction / 3
David Lyon and David Murakami Wood
Part 1: Understanding Surveillance, Security, and Big Data
1 Collaborative Surveillance with Big Data Corporations:
Interviews with Edward Snowden and Mark Klein / 21
Midori Ogasawara
2 On Denoting and Concealing in Surveillance Law / 43
Christopher Prince
3 Big Data against Terrorism / 57
Stéphane Leman-Langlois
4 Algorithms as Suspecting Machines: Financial Surveillance
for Security Intelligence / 68
Anthony Amicelle and David Grondin
Part 2: Big Data Surveillance and Signals Intelligence
in Canadian Security Organizations
5 From 1967 to 2017: The Communications Security Establishment’s
Transition from the Industrial Age to the Information Age / 89
Bill Robinson
vi Contents
6 Pixies, Pop-Out Intelligence, and Sandbox Play: The New Analytic
Model and National Security Surveillance in Canada / 112
Scott Thompson and David Lyon
7 Limits to Secrecy: What Are the Communications Security
Establishment’s Capabilities for Intercepting Canadians’ Internet
Communications? / 126
Andrew Clement
Part 3: Legal Challenges to Big Data Surveillance in Canada
8 Gleanings from the Security Intelligence Review Committee about
the Canadian Security Intelligence Service’s Bulk Data Holdings
and the Bill C-59 “Solution” / 149
Micheal Vonn
9 Bill C-59 and the Judicialization of Intelligence Collection / 167
Craig Forcese
10 The Challenges Facing Canadian Police in Making Use of Big Data
Analytics / 180
Carrie B. Sanders and Janet Chan
Part 4: Resistance to Big Data Surveillance
11 Confronting Big Data: Popular Resistance to Government
Surveillance in Canada since 2001 / 197
Tim McSorley and Anne Dagenais Guertin
12 Protesting Bill C-51: Reflections on Connective Action against Big
Data Surveillance / 218
Jeffrey Monaghan and Valerie Steeves
Part 5: Policy and Technical Challenges of
Big Data Surveillance
13 Horizontal Accountability and Signals Intelligence: Lessons
Drawing from Annual Electronic Surveillance Reports / 237
Christopher Parsons and Adam Molnar
Contents vii
14 Metadata – Both Shallow and Deep: The Fraught Key to Big Data
Mass State Surveillance / 253
Andrew Clement, Jillian Harkness, and George Raine
Afterword / 269
Holly Porteous
Contributors / 275
Index / 281
Figures and Tables
Figures
1.1 New Collection Posture NSA slide / 22
7.1 Canadian cyber sensor grid / 133
7.2 Boomerang route originating and terminating in Toronto / 136
14.1 “Context” as metadata category in XKEYSCORE / 261
Tables
7.1 Top border cities for Internet traffic entering Canada / 137
7.2 Top carriers bringing Internet data into Canada / 137
7.3 Principal concentrations of Internet routers by metropolitan area
and carrier / 139
Preface
This book examines one of the most pressing issues in the organization of
society today: the application of new data practices to both global systems and
everyday devices – in this case, those that have to do with national security. The
editors have been involved in research on surveillance in relation to security
for over two decades, but it is difficult to think of innovations as far-reaching
and consequential as those involving so-called big data. This is because they
rest on novel ways of using data, enabled by massive computing power, and
because they touch the lives of everyone. Intelligence gathering in the era of
social media and the Internet of Things cannot but implicate and involve all
citizens, domestically as well as in other countries, not just those conventionally
thought of as suspicious, risky, or threatening.
The book is the product of a large-scale research project involving several
Canadian universities as well as partners and collaborators in other countries,
with its central node at the Surveillance Studies Centre at Queen’s University
in Kingston, Ontario. Other lead researchers are from Université Laval, the
University of Ottawa, and the University of Victoria, along with St. Andrew’s
University in Scotland. This project is underwritten by a five-year Partnership
Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), in
which academic researchers work collaboratively with partners from both public
policy and civil society. More specifically, it comprises expert papers shared at
a very stimulating and fruitful research workshop held in Ottawa, in which both
academics and members of privacy commissions and civil liberties groups
contributed papers for discussion.
We are very grateful to the SSHRC both for the funding opportunity and for
the doors it opened for our research to be carried out in active cooperation with
our Canadian government policy and compliance bodies (the Office of the
Privacy Commissioner in Ottawa and the British Columbia Office of the Infor-
mation and Privacy Commissioner) and non-governmental organization
partners (the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group in Ottawa and the
BC Civil Liberties Association). These partnerships are evident in the chapters
of this book.
