Canadian Director Of RCMP Intelligence Charged With Leaking Secret Information

CBC: Intelligence community reeling after RCMP director accused of violating secrets act

Cameron Ortis faces charges under both Security of Information Act and Criminal Code

Canada's intelligence community is reeling after a senior official working with an RCMP intelligence team was charged under the Security of Information Act — an event that is expected to have a ripple effect for years.

Cameron Ortis — a civilian director general at the RCMP — faces three charges and multiple counts of the rarely used law that deals with communicating or confirming special operational information.

The Security of Information Act is designed to safeguard and protect Canada's secrets.

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WNU Editor: Being RCMP Director for intelligence, he had access to everything. This is a major hit to the intelligence community, and definitely one that is going to impact intelligence collection for years. The questions that still remain unanswered is .... who did he leaked this to? What was leaked? And was he discovered?

Update: Canada has some explaining to do .... Five Eyes allies raising questions as damage control continues in Cameron Ortis case: sources (CBC).

More News On The Canadian Director Of RCMP Intelligence Being Charged With Espionage

Senior RCMP civilian held in custody after first court appearance charged with seven secrecy offences -- Ottawa Citizen
Top Canadian police intelligence officer charged with leaking secret information -- Reuters
'Extremely alarming': RCMP charge head of intelligence unit with allegedly leaking government secrets -- National Post
Top Canadian Intelligence Official Charged With Leaking Secrets -- The New York Times
Intelligence official charged seemed to be 'exemplar of discretion': former colleague -- CTV News
RCMP intel director charged in major case was top adviser to former force head: sources -- Global News
Canadian police official held on spy charges -- Asia Times
Arrested Canadian intelligence officer oversaw Russia probe: reports -- DW
Canada Arrests Intelligence Officer Who Worked On Magnitsky Probe -- RFE

Canada's Intelligence Agency Calls Russian Hackers Morons

Sam Biddle, The Intercept: White House Says Russia's Hackers Are Too Good to Be Caught but NSA Partner Called Them “Morons”

THE HACKERS BEHIND the dump of Democratic Party emails in the midst of last year’s presidential race left apparent evidence of their identity — a breadcrumb trail winding from the stolen files back to the Russian government, according to assessments from the U.S. intelligence community. Some of this evidence was there from the beginning, embedded inside the first documents to hit the web, raising a niggling question: Why would diabolically skilled Russian operatives operate so sloppily?

This question has persisted, and last week the White House seized upon it, promulgating the idea that if the Russian government were really behind the attacks, its online agents wouldn’t have left any fingerprints. Russia quickly repeated this claim through its UK embassy.

But a 2011 presentation to the NSA and its foreign partners by Canada’s signals intelligence agency, the Communications Security Establishment, undermines the notion of a foreign hacker so skilled that a victim would never know their identity. The document calls Russian hackers “morons” for routinely compromising the security of a “really well designed” system intended to cover their tracks; for example, the hackers logged into their personal social and email accounts through the same anonymizing system used to attack their targets, comparable to getting an anonymous burner phone for illicit use and then placing calls to your girlfriend, parents, and roommate.

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WNU Editor: The Intercept is focused on a 2011 report from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service that makes the claim that Russia's hackers are morons .... 2011 !?!?!?! .... a lot has happened in the cyber world since then.

Hat tip to Fred for this link.