“I.Y.H.T.A- Y.D.W.T.K***”
the old man in the hat
Acronyms. Those wonderful bits of letters that mean something more. Usually they are cute mnemonics that help us remember complicated concepts or organizations.
For those in the know SOA and SAMCRO have special meanings as monikers for the tales of violence committed in the television series Sons of Anarchy aka Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club Redwood Original.
My new favourite is CSEC. How innocuous. Sounds like it could be a new diet. Communications Security Establishment Canada. SAH (Scary As H*%$).
Where did these guys come from? Apparently they are our very own home grown version of the NSA (National Security Agency), the American intelligence service that acts as a vacuum cleaner that sucks everything we type, text and speak into electronic communications. We have one in Canada. Who knew?
Apparently Ed Snowden did. He is the fiend or hero, depending on your patriotic index, that told the world about all the interesting, previously secret and maybe illegal activities of the aforementioned NSA, his former employer. Can you image that the PMO (Prime Minister’s Office) gets a daily report about that call you made last night. You remember that 900 number, that you thought would be fun. It was just some guy telling you that you dialled the wrong number. In Farsi.
Yes, I realize that this is Canada, and we are boring and that nothing ever happens here. Well almost nothing. We should forget about the Mounties blowing up those barns in the seventies. Things have changed. Almost everywhere. Until Snowden.
We now know that CSEC has been trying out their toys at an unidentified airport by collecting data from the free wi-fi offered to the travelling public, and then following the communications for a period of time afterwards.
Of course, the Minister responsible is denying that Canadians were in fact tracked, and contrary to what Snowden has claimed, nothing, in fact, happened. We know that nothing happened because the Honourable Jean-Pierre Plouffe, the CSEC commissioner watchdog, says so.
The website of the commissioner contains an interesting statement:
“The Security of Information Act prohibits anyone permanently bound to secrecy from communicating or confirming “special operational information”, which is defined to include information about the kinds of activities the Communications Security Establishment (CSE) lawfully undertakes.”
So, I guess we will take his word for it, unless of course it is secret, in which case he has to lie to us in order to protect us. From us. Kafka anyone?
(***“I.Y.H.T.A- Y.D.W.T.K”- If You Have to Ask- You Don’t Want to Know)
Further Reading:
http://rt.com/news/canada-snowden-spying-nsa-airport-442/
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/01/31/edward-snowden-csec-ndp_n_4703375.html
http://www.ocsec-bccst.gc.ca/index_e.php
