ISP's maintain a full record of all internet activity related to your IP address. Exactly what sites, when and how long you accessed them.
IIRC, the Federal government tried to force ISP's provide a direct access backdoor into their data centres but again, IIRC, this was abandoned when the Vic Toews scandal erupted.
This bill will basically legalize any actions of the government to monitor and record your online activities. And once the powers are handed over to LE, there is no oversight body they have to answer to.
I don't think this is a personal "Harper" initiative, rather the spy agencies crying wolf and coming to the govt with dire warnings of terrorism if they don't get these powers. I do hold Harper et al responsible though as they could amend the bill to address some of the concerns of everyday Canadians such as saying that if they discover something that is NOT related to terrorism, that they must break off the surveillance and such evidence cannot be used in any way. But I suspect that this is exactly the power they want.
Funny enough, just a couple days ago, The Star published an article in which CSIS said that State-sponsored (Read CHINA) attacks on every segment of our IT infrastructure are so persistent and escalating that they simply can't even defend us from these
known attacks. And I don't see any one from the govt threatening to cut off trade with China over it. In fact, they just signed a new trade deal with China not so long ago.
You'd think with finite resources (i.e. taxes) that they'd worry about the big, real threats to our economy and state security rather than thinking they need to have carte blanche to surveil mom and pop.
Read more here
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/...with-daily-state-sponsored-cyber-attacks.html
"OTTAWA—Canada’s spies admit they can’t keep up with daily cyber attacks from state-sponsored hackers, according to an internal report obtained by the Star.A heavily censored “threat overview” prepared by CSIS last September stated hostile “state-sponsored” hackers are targeting everything from political positions and trade strategies to commercial data and personal information.
“Hostile state-sponsored actors (are targeting) Canadian public and private computer networks daily to advance their economic, military, (and) political agendas,” reads the report, prepared for Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney’s office.
“Offensive cyber operations (are) employed with more traditional methods in support of strategic and economic objectives.”
