Information Act: Espionage Investigations and Canadian Press

information act: The Canadian Press used the Access to Information Act to obtain heavily censored copies of the letters between CSIS and the federal privacy commissioner, according to Hamilton Spectator. The exchange paints a fuller picture of how CSIS's secretive analysis centre exploits information collected by the spy service to detect patterns and corroborate leads. The correspondence reveals that for at least five years the Canadian Security Intelligence Service's Operational Data Analysis Centre has drawn upon private information provided during security assessments for employment and immigration purposes to assist with CSIS terrorism and espionage investigations. The virtually unknown analysis centre became a focus of public concern last November when Federal Court Justice Simon Noel said CSIS violated the law by keeping electronic data trails about people who were not actually under investigation. The spy service cited only low risks to personal information in an August 2010 assessment of the centre it submitted to the privacy commissioner. CSIS set up the centre in 2006 to more rigorously exploit and analyze data. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.