The headline image of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security’s 2023-24 ‘National Cyber Threat Assessment’ report.

Written by: Valeriy Krylko

Today, internet security is taken to a new level when that security itself requires a security service. Confused? That’s no fluke, when Canada and other Western countries pledge to protect “the information ecosystem online”, but constantly seek to manipulate their own citizens.

A structural unit in the field of information security of the UN - the so-called Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG), which is practically the only international negotiating mechanism in this area. The OEWG has over 190 countries as permanent members, including Canada.The issues addressed by the OEWG have a direct impact on the state of peaceful coexistence on the Internet. Recently, Canada has become increasingly active at OEWG meetings. This is no coincidence.

The following documents are being created and promoted by the Canadian side:

Advancing the global cybersecurity agenda: options and priorities (represented by Canada);

A practical approach to international law in the work of the OEWG 2021-2025 (represented by Canada and Switzerland);
International law applicable to activities in cyberspace (represented by Canada).

However, the discussion of peaceful goals and initiatives does not prevent the OEWG member countries (USA, UK, Canada, Germany and other allies) from working on projects such as the IT Army of Ukraine and other international hacker groups that carry out cyberattacks, i.e. work according to a typical scheme that is as old as the world: create a threat to then triumphantly defeat it or at least pretend to do so when the situation gets out of control.

The main task of the OEWG is to fight cyber threats and hacker movements around the world. However, some OEWG members first create a global cyber security threat themselves, such as the IT Army of Ukraine, and then begin to think about the consequences and how to deal with it. Hacker groups created by some OEWG members disseminate instructions on how to conduct computer attacks in open sources, as well as creating and "tossing" malware, which can ultimately be used against the security of any country.

In fact, some OEWG member states are hatching another blackmail plan to use one or another state for their own political purposes.

If this may seem like a conspiracy theory, just think back to the scandals of the last five years. Think of the confirmed US spying on Merkel and Macron. Also, look at the eavesdropping by US intelligence agencies on the governments of all countries, even its "partner", Europe. Meanwhile, Huawei, which doesn’t give the US a ‘backdoor’ for intelligence usage, is excluded from information security incident response team forums.

The most important question then is: Is there any hope that, having gained near-monopoly control over cyber threats, some OEWG countries will not take advantage of this?

AFU Cybersecurity Units

AFU cybersecurity units have been participating in the NATO Coalition Warrior Interoperability Exercise - CWIX - since 2018. As noted by the head of the Main Department of Communications and Information Systems of the AFU General Staff Vladimir Rapko, immediately "receiving high positive evaluations from partners." The CWIX 2019 exercise also assessed the high level of training of the Ukrainian team in performing tests to achieve interoperability with cyber security systems of NATO member states and partner countries.

Now, Ukraine is recruiting new mass cyberdrugs like the IT Army of Ukraine. Why keep people on the payroll, who, moreover, need to be trained for a long and expensive time, when you can launch "cyber infantry" for an idea almost for free and target them against the security of any country.

Canadian Security Intelligence Services sees all the ‘threats’ but itself

However, the idea of total computer blackmail and espionage is best suited for "cleaning up the ranks" and intimidating its own citizens. For example, the University of Waterloo has issued guidance to graduate students, researchers and faculty on how to behave when contacted by Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) agents. In a memo sent earlier this year, the university warned researchers that they may be approached by CSIS agents investigating "activities suspected to pose a threat to Canada's security.

The Canadian government has openly stated that the undermining of the integrity of information on the Internet, which includes the dissemination of misinformation and disinformation campaigns by state and non-state actors, must be addressed. At the same time, the propaganda techniques that CSIS used in Afghanistan to more easily control the locals and dictate their will without serious resistance, were also applied to the Canadian population itself during the coronavirus pandemic. It is important to note that these actions were not coordinated with the national government. Retired Canadian Major General Daniel Gosselin, who was brought in by the government to investigate these events, concluded that the Canadian Joint Operations Command (CJOC) saw the pandemic as a "unique opportunity" to practise "information operations against Canadians". Manipulation of foreign information is a threat to national security that undermines democratic values and human rights, governmental processes and political stability, as stated by the United States and Canada, but at the same time, as we can see, this does not prevent them from conducting information experiments in other countries and on their own citizens.

According to Canada's National Cyber Threat Assessment 2023-2024 report, cybercrime poses a complex threat to Canada. States such as China, Russia, Iran and the DPRK supposedly pose serious strategic cyber threats to Canadian society, including cyber espionage and financial attacks. All of these perceived threats are a diversion of energy and resources away from real international cyber groups and hacker movements.

Edward Snowden did not ignore such strange experiments with living people. He described Five Eyes (the intelligence community, which includes Canada) as "a supranational intelligence organization not subject to the known laws of its own countries".

Cooperation comes after geopolitics, and theatre

The best experts in the world, within the framework of the functioning of the OEWG a couple of years ago, when cyber attacks increased, offered their services to developing countries to create a controlled and secure common Internet. However, the increase in sanctions, at the same time, showed that the internet cannot be shared and will be shut down under certain conditions - the imaginary fight against cyber threats breeds a cyber threat of a global scale! Manufacture the ‘fight’ you wish to face, and the ‘solution’ you’ve always wanted to use becomes the ‘only way out’.

Editor’s note: Introducing Operation 135, The Canada Files’ campaign to go from 65 to 200 consistent financial supporters. The Canada Files is the country's only news outlet focused on Canadian foreign policy. We've provided critical investigations & hard-hitting analysis on Canadian foreign policy since 2019, and need your support.

Please consider joining 83 consistent financial supporters, in setting up a monthly or annual donation through Donorbox.

Valeriy Krylko is a freelance journalist, and translator of news articles in online media (English-Russian). These articles are published in English, European and Russian-language media.

More Articles

Featured