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Comment by bahman2000 | Hacker News Reader

bahman2000

I'm pretty sure that no legitimate covert service operative would identify themselves as such, nor would they brag about going to conferences.

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Working for CSIS doesn't mean that you're a covert operative. I know plenty of present and past employees of CSIS, CSEC, CIA, NSA, GCHQ, etc -- my understanding is that the general rule is "don't call attention to your affiliation, but it's ok to say if evading questions would draw even more attention to you".

this whole account sounds patently ridiculous considering the nature of cryptocat.

i would like to think that "CSIS" had better things to do.

Spying on and harassing activists has, for a long time, been a big part of what CSIS does. I personally know tech activists that have been spied on and harassed. The RCMP is also known for this.

Mainstream new story from a couple weeks ago in which activist orgs complained of CSIS harassment:

http://www.ctvnews.ca/activists-warn-against-csis-intimidati...

Spying on and harassing activists has, for a long time, been a big part of what CSIS does.

Give me a break.

Canada has a very open door immigration policy. Unfortunately that open door draws in people who actually don't like what Canada is about (which makes it weird that they would come here) and who conspire against, effectively, Canadian society. I welcome that law enforcement cares about this and does normal investigations.

Further from a corporate perspective it is well known that China, in particular, is going absolutely rampant with corporate espionage in the West. This is a major concern.

Or just call it some sort of "anti-activism" creed.

>Unfortunately that open door draws in people who actually don't like what Canada is about ... Or just call it some sort of "anti-activism" creed.

Sounds like what you're saying is that because CSIS does some legitimate things it means they don't also do less legitimate things, like harass/spy on activists.

Perhaps the confusion is because CSIS spying on people is a legit thing.

Writing cryptography tools, and activism in general, aren't illegal and people who don't break laws should not be spied on or harassed.

If they knew who the lawbreakers were, they wouldn't need to spy on anyone.

Good logic to justify blanket domestic surveillance.

I personally know and have seen the logs from an activist who has CSIS host-names show up in his blog for the past few years. This came after the G8 fiasco in Toronto, where they pulled him in for questioning.

I personally know and have seen the logs from an activist who has CSIS host-names show up in his blog for the past few years.

So? I have the CIA appear in my blog logs and have for years. People work there, and some of them like blogs. Is that, apparently, "harassment"?

They do spy on and harass First Nations activists, notoriously.

Investigating people who are doing unusual things is part of their job. In cases like the Occupy movement, it's entirely appropriate for them to say "gee, something's going on -- it seems mostly peaceful so far, but does it have the potential to become violent later?" and investigate.

Surely all 2500 CSIS agents are busy harassing the other three high-profile 23 year old crypto hacktivists in Canada

Same goes for the DHS. Yet, from the Wikipedia article about Cryptocat:

Cryptocat developer Nadim Kobeissi was detained and questioned at the U.S. border by the DHS in June 2012 about its censorship resistance.

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