A former director of Canada’s spy agency says the tendency of government entities to protect and over-classify information plays well with officials who seek to avoid public controversy.
“Over time, the protective culture becomes dominant and this actually sits well with ministers and central agencies and senior officials, especially when ... the practical effect is reducing the likelihood of controversy,” Richard Fadden told the Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference on Jan. 31.
Mr. Fadden served as the director of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) from 2009 to 2013 and afterward as the prime minister’s national security adviser.
He testified alongside former top intelligence officials to provide expert advice to the Foreign Interference Commission on how it can accomplish its mandate of making as much information available to the public as possible without jeopardizing state secrets.
The inquiry was spurred by pressure from political and civil society after national security leaks in the press depicted widespread election meddling by the Chinese regime.
Mr. Fadden said he wasn’t suggesting that avoidance of controversy or partisanship were the reasons for the dilemma on whether to release information, but he pointed out that no one within the system advocates for more transparency.
“If by happenstance your invoking protection under a particular legal provision means that you’re not releasing something that would cause all sorts of controversy, there’s nobody in the system that points in the opposite direction,” he said. He noted that the Information Commissioner doesn’t get involved in the classified space.
The former CSIS director suggested that laws and policies are subject to interpretation and that, over time, these interpretations have formed cultures in different organizations, such as CSIS or the Communications Security Establishment (CSE).
The culture in those agencies is reinforced by what he calls “closed personnel systems,” where individuals who join make it a career and strive to climb the hierarchical ladder. “That really results in a culture that’s very, very, very strong,” Mr. Fadden said.
This can lead to a narrow worldview and affect decisions about how to classify or declassify information, he added. Mr. Fadden also said Canada as a whole tends to be more protective of sensitive information when compared to Five Eyes intelligence partners Australia, the United States, and the UK.
Alan Jones, a former assistant director of operations at CSIS, noted that Canada is a “net importer” of intelligence. This adds a level of complexity when asking foreign governments to disclose their information.
“They may not be happy about it, because sometimes they would wish that Canada would resolve its own issues without asking them to have to become part of it, but there’s no real risk of damage to the relationship,” he said.
‘At All Costs’
John Forster, a former chief of CSE, Canada’s signals intelligence agency, spoke about the need for both CSE and CSIS to protect their sources, techniques, and technology “at all costs.”He noted that even if an intelligence report is stripped of some details, it can still point to how the information was obtained.
“That puts your sources at risk, or your target will take steps to evade your technology and techniques, and you go dark, and so that’s always going to be a very critical consideration,” said Mr. Forster.
With the commission having to be cognizant of that issue, Mr. Fadden said that dealing with assessed intelligence products that don’t go into the details about collection methods, instead of raw reports, can be easier to release publicly.
“It’s in these kinds of reports, where you have a little bit more flexibility to argue that if you take out two words, or if you aggregate up a level, or if you compare them to the allies, you might get them to release,” he said.
Mr. Fadden noted that only once did he give a raw intelligence report to the prime minister.
“For those people who are asking for raw intelligence or details, I guess my thought would be, why should they get it when the prime minister doesn’t, because he really doesn’t get it except in the most exceptional circumstances.”
Another suggestion from the former top official was to have the Privy Council Office (PCO) play a role in the matter of releasing information because it is more detached from the data than the originating agencies.
Public Safety Minister Dominic Leblanc will close off the first phase of public hearings on Feb. 2. The next phase should take place in March and involve the core function of the inquiry, which is to look at foreign interference in the past two federal elections.
