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Ottawa wants the power to create secret backdoors in networks for surveillance
- nsxwolf 2y agoI read this first as "China".
- sqeaky 2y agoThat is what we were told as kids, but at least some of that was deflection for crimes of our fellow citizens.
- babra4151 2y ago[dead]
- h2odragon 2y agoCan't they just ask the NSA for their backdoors? What are allies for, after all?
- rolph 2y agolets flip the coin over, suppose the NSA, has been nattering at canada to get up to date, and resume fulfilment of obligations to a current standard.
- Scoundreller 2y agoIs that why my Canadian ISP used to route so much local traffic through USA? (I think it has gotten better now, but Bell used to only freely peer in USA, in Canada you had to pay for transit. Most non-big3 Canadian ISPs would route a lot of domestic traffic through Chicago and other peer points).
- seanw444 2y agoCanada being totalitarian? I'm shocked.
- tomComb 2y agoI know that opponents of the current gov are enjoying this line recently, but our government is so far from totalitarianism that this seems silly to me. The real problem is oligopoly, not fascism or anything like that. The government puts most of its effort into protecting friendly companies and industries from competition and even funneling taxpayer money to them. In the case of Bell & Rogers this is billions of $ a year.
- johnny99k 2y agoHave we forgotten Covid so quickly? People involved in a legal protest had their bank accounts seized.
- transcriptase 2y ago[flagged]
- lupusreal 2y ago[flagged]
- tensor 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- lupusreal 2y ago[flagged]
- tensor 2y agoI used to live in Toronto near queen's park. There were very frequent protests down yonge and in queens park. Never once in all the time I lived there was I prevented sleeping by protestors honking outside my building all night. I was also never once confronted, cornered, harassed, or yelled at by protestors. Not once. These actions are not ok and not typical of any protest. Yes I was frequently inconvenienced with the street blocked, but that's fine, the cost of living in a democracy. Protesting does not involve attacking fellow citizens.
- CherieGarza 2y ago[dead]
- mikerg87 2y agoWhat could possible go wrong with this asinine idea.
- poochipie 2y agohttps://archive.is/y6d41 https://archive.is/y6d41
- poochipie 2y agoHow else will $GOVERNING_PARTY find out which of their political opponents' bank accounts they should freeze?
- canadiantim 2y agoRest assured, they already have their The Liberalist database for that. For those who don't know, that's the Liberal party's voter outreach database... also used for picking judges! It's a great system we have where $CANADAS_NATURAL_GOVERNING_PARTY picks and chooses judges based on their loyalty score in the party database. Source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberalist-judicial-appointments-trudeau-lametti-1.6059297 https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberalist-judicial-appoint... Note: There are no checks and balances regarding whether or not they are still using it. As such, the default assumption must be that they are still using it.
- nvy 2y agoAll parties appoint partisan judges. If you think your party of choice doesn't then you need to give your head a shake.
- poochipie 2y agoFrom the shared link: "The Trudeau government has stopped using the Liberal Party's private database to conduct background checks on candidates for judicial appointments, federal sources say." This is a specific claim about the Liberals that is not refuted by suppositions about other parties, even if the supposition is likely true.
- nvy 2y agoI'm not attempting to refute it. I'm suggesting that the idea that only the Liberals appoint partisan judges is absurd, because they're all corrupt.
- canadiantim 2y agoI wonder why the government decided to stop using their private party database to vet judges then? If it’s all kosher and above board why did they stop?
- markus_zhang 2y agoAll in the name of security. Sure, go ahead, let the curtain fall.
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoI hate this but isn’t this what the US is secretly doing anyways? How did outrage in America die down?
- seanw444 2y agoThe spying is too far removed from the average person's life that people don't care enough. One person sitting in your house watching everything you do would be really spooky, and everyone would be upset. Countless unidentified people watching everything you do, anywhere, from anywhere, is of course not nearly as spooky (/s). I'm still of the opinion that the US proper ceased to exist after the American Civil War. Makes me sad every time I think about it. And no, I'm not including slavery.
- pc86 2y agoWhat rights did someone have in 1790 that they didn't have in 1890?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ImJamal 2y agoNot who you are replying to, but there was a shift in opinion about what the US actually was and the powers the states had. One of those shifts was instead of people saying the "United States are" people started saying the "United States is". This change caused a shift away from the primacy of the 10th amendment. Instead of the US government just handling the military, foreign affairs, etc it started butting into more and more things happening within the country. Look at Wickard v Filburn for example. The 14th amendment also started to be reinterpreted to mean the incorporation of the Bill of Rights. Prior to this reinterpretation the thought was that the Bill of Rights applied to the federal government not to the state governments. The federal government was not allowed to establish a state church, for example, but the states could (and did!). The federal government couldn't ban guns but the sates could. So the states themselves lost a lot of rights and the people did as well (see my example of Wickard v Filburn).
- kevinprince 2y agoThis keeps coming up in most countries every few years. Everyone seems to forget in nearly every country telecoms are licensed industries and providing legal intercept is a legal obligation of those licenses.
- seanw444 2y agoAh okay, the law says so, so it must be acceptable.
- londons_explore 2y agoI just want everyone to be aware of this. Every call or chat conversation that is intercepted should have an audible/text message saying "beep. beep. Sergeant Tom smith has joined this conversation as allowed by wiretapping regulations for your safety and security". Followed by "This conversation is now being recorded by Sergeant Tom Smith".
- rustcleaner 2y agoNo we should ignore the loons in Washington and instead use Session/Briar to communicate privately. What Senator Timmy gonna to do, pass a law? :^)
- potterken 2y ago[dead]
- worewood 2y agoWhile they have the power to backdoor telecom networks for surveillance, what they actually want is a way of doing this without legal oversight or recourse to traditional legal gatekeeping like warrants. So we should not shrug this off just because "they already can do it".
- tamimio 2y agoPretty much, as right now with proper legal justification the government can access any communication, or at least get the meta data associated with.
- sandworm101 2y agoWe have seen these a thousand times. I say bring it on. The pendulum has swung solidly into the hands of users. We have so many privacy tools to counter state surveillance these days. Any country openly conducting mass surveillance will soon see the target population wrap itself in VPNs and encrypted services. Remember when ISPs began throttling torrents? Everyone then flicked the switch and torrent traffic become encrypted. Remember the London riots, what happened to RIM shortly afterwards? Remember Lavabit? Go ahead and tap my SMS or whatsapp text messages. That's the push I need to switch the last of my friends over to Signal.
- poochipie 2y agoAccelerationism[0] FTW. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism
- RegnisGnaw 2y agoSee China, most people are totally okay with it and VPNs are rare.
- kredd 2y agoThe reality is super majority of user base don’t care about data privacy or what government can see as long as it doesn’t affect their day to day lives. There was a big outrage when WhatsApp changed their privacy policy, everyone is still using it. Supermajority of people who live in China are not using any of the western social media. Or how nobody cares when there’s a breach of personal data, and it gets leaked online. Again, unless it affects them directly, it really doesn’t matter. We (people in tech and tech-adjacent fields) are in an extremely fringe bubble. And I can’t really blame them, after all who has time to think about all the second order effects of different policy changes.
- rustcleaner 2y ago>Again, unless it affects them directly, it really doesn’t matter. It does affect them directly, doesn't anyone know why they're broke all the time (aside from inflation)? Is it possible all that harmless telemetry for harmless marketing purposes actually isn't so harmless, and Terminator is inducing you to buy products you like but really don't need more than the savings you're splurging with? No, can't be! If people woke up to how insideously manipulated they are at large... oh man!
- johnnyAghands 2y agoIts almost as if these policy makers don't know anything about anything.
- MathMonkeyMan 2y agoI've met people who believe that there are good guys and bad guys, that they are the good guys, and that there should be no protections for the bad guys. You can't convince them that to others, or in the future, they might be seen as the bad guys. Because that just isn't true -- they're the good guys.
- lupusreal 2y agoTheir crystal ball for telling the future has proven that they are on "the right side of history [which hasn't yet occurred]."
- myth_drannon 2y ago[flagged]
- mistermann 2y agoNot to worry: I learned in school (from an expert no less) that all people are the same.
- myth_drannon 2y agoHumans are born the same, blank slate but raised differently.
- rustcleaner 2y agoFalse. Clean slate is fallacious.
- piltdownman 2y agoCanada has the power to backdoor telecom networks for surveillance. All host nations do for their infrastructure as part of the RAN Architecture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawful_interception https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawful_interception What Canada seems to actually want is a way of doing this without legal oversight or recourse to traditional legal gatekeeping like warrants.
- mrandish 2y agoGiven the rapidly declining state of individual privacy, when discussing these extensions it helps to be specific about the authorized agency and context. For example, these days, it's pretty much a given that NSA-type spy agencies are already getting all of whatever electronic communications they want with little friction. In the US there are certain supposed safeguards against surveilling US citizens domestically but we've already seen how quickly and easily these have been circumvented by using partner 'five eyes' agencies and commercial data brokers. While this is obviously problematic, to me, it's even worse if domestic law enforcement agencies gain new ways to remove friction like warrant requirements or at least the need to make specific per-instance requests (which are possible to (in theory) be tracked and reviewed to detect over-use and abuse). The idea of domestic law enforcement agencies gaining access to "full take" feeds of everything enabling them to retrospectively build massive connection trees of metadata which can be searched is downright terrifying.
- jonny_eh 2y agoGood insight. The difference between the NSA and local cops is that the NSA won't be looking for some bullshit to use as an excuse to arrest or harass you.
- somenameforme 2y agoNope, but they will be looking for your nudes. [1] [1] - https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/nude-photos-of-strangers-are-a-fringe-benefit-for-nsa-employees-says-snowden-9614097.html https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/nude-photos-of-strangers-...
- BA_and_bored 2y agoAre we supposed to believe that 5 eyes aren't doing it already?
- tharmas 2y agoYes, but they can't use it in court. This, presumably, would enable the info to be used in court.
- achrono 2y agoIf Snowden and Assange have taught us one thing, it is that state-sponsored surveillance is not a topic you want to have a very high evidence threshold for. The available evidence is always going to lag the actuality and even what we previously thought of as exaggerations/outliers in terms of suspicions of surveillance (e.g. "NSA knows I hate broccoli") have turned out to be not so unwarranted after all.
- somenameforme 2y agoThe NSA was literally spying in World of Warcraft. [1] About the time you have spooks running around in video games as Elves 'for national defense', you know we live in the dumb (but endlessly entertaining) timeline. [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/09/nsa-spies-online-games-world-warcraft-second-life https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/09/nsa-spies-onli...
- mschuster91 2y agoOnline games have historically been quite a way for people to organize beyond the wide Internet. Steam and Discord in particular gained notoriety in recent years [1], but I distinctly remember UT2004 being flooded with Nazi trolls all the time even around 2010. [1] https://www.wired.com/story/far-right-took-over-steam-discord/ https://www.wired.com/story/far-right-took-over-steam-discor...
- adamomada 2y agoThere was a show on Amazon a few years ago called Patriot about the misfortunes of a CIA operative with hardly any support from the agency. An interesting part was that even though he used a blackberry, arguably having better e2e messaging than today, the comms were done through some online scrabble game.
- somenameforme 2y agoYeah it seems like that show's gone full Hollywood with other takes like "Leslie pull[s] his teeth to bypass facial recognition software" according to Wiki. [1] The fact facial recognition doesn't use your teeth and can be fooled using simple makeup or prosthetics to manipulate the perceived depth of your face? Nah, screw it - just pull your teeth mate! [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_(TV_series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_(TV_series)
- lupusreal 2y agoFor some reason, Canada wants us to believe they don't already have this.
- jmclnx 2y agoWell with GNU pg, you can have all the backdoors in networks all you want, but it will do Canada no good. But I sometimes wonder if the M/S push to Windows 11 w/tpm2 allows for a backdoor on Windows. I also think the move of Apple to the [M1-n] chips may allow the same :) But back to reality, I believe 99% of these backdoor pushes are mainly for Cell Phones. Almost no one uses a PC these days for communication.
- bluefirebrand 2y ago> Almost no one uses a PC these days for communication. Probably quite a lot of the people that governments want to keep a fairly close eye on do still use PCs or laptops though
- rvba 2y agoTons of people use teams/zoom/other to make calls on their PCs. Also emails and chats..
- markhahn 2y agono one uses a PC for communication? why even would you apparently equate that silly msft with desktop use? that silliness aside, there are serious limits to how much access even bios/TPM/SMM compromises can provide. for instance, if I audit my network, your use of SMM to compromise my machine can be mitigated. the picture may be different if you seize my machine, of course, but we all know that most bets are off with physical access.
- croes 2y agoI think this is the new part additional to existing surveillance >This could include requiring telcos to alter the 5G encryption standards that protect mobile communications to facilitate government surveillance.
- moose44 2y agoI don’t understand the point of attempting to pass a bill and draw attention to the subject if they already do this? Context: https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadas-public-health-agency-admits-it-tracked-33-million-mobile-devices-during-lockdown https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadas-public-health-a...
- rustcleaner 2y agoCall me paranoid (I'll fess up to it), but I think client-side scanners like Recall are expressly for defeating E2EE without breaking the math or hardware. With NPU-powered client-side scanning combined with lexical analysis techniques, even if YOU are knowledgeable enough to have privately ditched Apple/Google/Microsoft permanently: your mentally normie-tier anon fren may be using a Copilot+ with Recall, and so Microsoft gets to read the conversation on his machine and then sus you out.
- maxglute 2y agoOnly matter of time before OS/recall operators realize they're sitting on stockpile of "accidentally" captured critical info and get into the information brokers game.
- rolandog 2y ago"Microsoft: best Linux salesperson!"
- davikr 2y agoIt won't be long until Microsoft offers "backing up" your Recall data into OneDrive, where LEO will be able to easily subpoena it. For instance, WhatsApp strongly suggests backing up your data to Drive, where it's easy to obtain a copy if you're a cop.
- heavyset_go 2y agoThey won't even need to subpoena it, companies like Microsoft, Google, Apple, etc regularly just hand over data when asked nicely by law enforcement. Some of them even have portals to automate the process.
- rustcleaner 2y agoI wish I could find some old talks by John Quaid (actor Dennis Quaid's father). I remember one entitled "I don't need no stinking drivers license" or something. This headline really brings those to mind.
- HeatrayEnjoyer 2y agoIs he as much of an insane clown as his kid?
- mysterypie 2y ago> In 2017, the CBC demonstrated how hackers only needed a Canadian MP’s cell number to intercept his movements, text messages and phone calls. > From the linked article: First, the hackers were able to record a conversation between Dubé in his office on Parliament Hill and our Radio-Canada colleague Brigitte Bureau, who was sitting at a café in Berlin. So many questions! Does this still work? On any phone using SS7? Including landlines and mobile phones? From anywhere in the world? To anywhere in the world? What are the limitations of the attack? Why isn't this a vastly bigger problem if anyone can listen in on anyone's calls?
- martincmartin 2y agoThe Economist had an article about this last week: https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/05/17/it-is-dangerously-easy-to-hack-the-worlds-phones https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/05/17/... (Accompanying editorial: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/05/23/hacking-phones-is-too-easy-time-to-make-it-harder https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/05/23/hacking-phones-...)
- cbsmith 2y agoYeah, SS7 was not really designed for the scenarios it now finds itself in (hell, I remember my dad talking to me about it back in the 80's). It's amazing how well it works, but that's exactly the context where one expects to find security vulnerabilities in spades. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_System_No._7 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_System_No._7
- foresto 2y agoI wonder if it's time for democracies to constitutionally enshrine encryption into our systems of due process (or whatever the correct legal term is). It would seem to align well with the concept of checks and balances, at least.
- motohagiography 2y agoThe problem with these efforts is they aren't for responding to actual crime or safety concerns, but for securing party rule and controlling dissent. Policy attempts like this indicate that given the pace of tech change vs. managerialism, Canada is basically a write off destined for decades of developing nation status the way former powers like Portugal, Greece, Argentina, and Spain were considered poor countries in the late 20th century because of ruling parties similar to the ones in Canada today. When a government switches from growth to managing dissent and capital flight, the writing is on the wall.
- helloooooooo 2y agolol cope
- TriangleEdge 2y agoI have some knowledge of the LI (lawful intercept) space. Some USA/Canada agencies/companies uses tools by JSI Telecom to do this. They do deep packet inspection and phone call recording with retention policies set by whatever law the host country has. For calls that are recorded, you cant record chats to lawyers, so a human has to listen to the call and mute it. Some countries don't allow recording, so a human has to listen in on the call live. Blah blah blah. My opinion is that democracy will die in favor of republics where govts do whatever. Seems to me were heading that way anyway. I find the theater of it tiring.
- gchokov 2y agoCanada used to be a great country not that far in the past.
- kennywinker 2y agoWhen? The last residential school closed in 1996, so anything before that is out.
- babra4151 2y ago[dead]
- nativeit 2y ago> …while government MPs maintained that their intent is not to expand surveillance capabilities, So…what’s their official rationale for including it? >MPs pushed the bill out of committee without this critical amendment last month. In doing so, the government has set itself up to be the sole arbiter of when, and on what conditions, Canadians deserve security for their most confidential communications – personal, business, religious, or otherwise. Not just the Canadian government! Let’s not forget the criminals and foreign adversaries who compromise their systems!
- fagrobot 2y ago[dead]
- imchillyb 2y agoEvery government on earth wants this, and they'll have it. The backdoors may not occur today, nor tomorrow. They may take another couple of years to implement, but they'll be there. The data-collective desires it. The backdoors are too useful to deny. It's not doom-and-gloom to state this certainty. It's merely a logical progression from yesterday and today. Make your peace with it. Much like ledgerized ecurrencies backdoors and surveillance isn't decreasing, it's taking over.
- banku_brougham 2y agoMy summation of what I've learned in this comment thread: People are going to have to learn to talk in person again. Dont express opinions on the internet. Give up on that hope for a better world. Prepare for what you will do when your draft number comes up, because there will be wars and you will be expected to take part. Your food and water will be adulturated endlessly. You will be pushed around by cops. Knowing influential party members (either/both) will be a necessity.
- 0xbadc0de5 2y agoWhen a government fears its citizens, it is a democracy. When the citizens fear the government, it is a tyranny. Stop building the chains that will be used to enslave you.
- gloosx 2y ago>This could include requiring telcos to alter the 5G encryption standards that protect mobile communications to facilitate government surveillance. I laughed so hard at this :D Really funny stuff... >So it makes no sense that the Canadian government would itself seek the ability to create more holes, rather than patching them. This almost killed me, ahahahahah, really. Makes no freaking sense.... Here is the reality of it: before 5G, some infrastructure around SS7 was needed to get to the data of any network user. In a 5G network, this is all built-in functionality, so you can see that country or another spending $billions of public money to get a better tool for surveilliance on public while selling it as another slightly better speed limit. Obviously no government gives a shit about privacy when they are so easily covered by national security, so don't be delusioned.