OTTAWA—The Conservatives defended Ottawa’s electronic spy agency Wednesday in the wake of revelations of a massive surveillance program targeting file-sharing websites.

Working with the journalist in possession of a cache of documents from whistleblower Edward Snowden, the CBC reported Wednesday that the Communications Security Establishment was running a massive surveillance program tracing traffic on file-hosting websites.

The program, dubbed LEVITATION, tracked between 10 million and 15 million downloads and uploads to file-sharing websites per day. According to documents, the search was meant to flag access to suspicious files, and turned up around 350 “interesting download events” each month.

The revelations brought renewed questions from opposition critics about the legality of CSE’s operations, and whether or not the secretive spy agency is picking up Canadian citizens’ private information.

“No one is questioning the need to go after those who download terrorism-related material,” NDP defence critic Jack Harris said in the House of Commons. “However, what we are concerned about is the potential that the Communications Security Establishment may again be going beyond its mandate and monitoring Canadians.”

Associate defence minister Julian Fantino defended the agency, but did not address the specifics of the program.

“CSE’s foreign signals intelligence plays a vital role in revealing the efforts of foreign terrorists to carry out attacks against Canadians here and abroad,” Fantino said. “These CSE actions have been sanctioned by the commissioner, who has indicated that its actions are lawful.”

There is nothing in the documents that indicate CSE is intentionally targeting Canadian citizens. But Christopher Parsons, with Citizens’ Lab, said the sheer size of the program makes it unlikely Canadians’ data weren’t caught in the drag net.

“The scope at which they are processing data means it is highly likely that Canadian information is — they would use the term ‘incidentally’ — being collected,” Parsons said.

The Star requested an interview with CSE, and provided detailed questions to the intelligence agency. An interview was “not possible,” the agency replied. In a written statement, a spokesman for CSE said the agency has never been found to have acted unlawfully, and couldn’t comment on operations.

Correction - January 29, 2015: This article was edited from a previous version that said LEVITATION tracked between 10 million and 15 million downloads and uploads to file-sharing websites.



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