OTTAWA—CSEC, the uber-secret spy agency that you probably never heard of, has quietly donned a comfortable old identity and shed part of its more modern name — just like a top secret spy would.

Communications Security Establishment Canada, the spy agency that collects foreign security intelligence by combing the Internet and airwaves of the world, is dropping “Canada” from its name.

For old hands, CSE is the familiar handle. It was always hard to get used to C-S-E-C.

The CSE traces its history back to Second World War decoding operations that Canada conducted in support of Britain. In 1946, operatives were gathered under the communications branch of the National Research Council, and later, in 1975, named the Communications Security Establishment, reporting to the defence minister.

Since the 9/11 terror attacks, the CSE has doubled its staff, now numbering about 2,000 top-flight military and civilian signals technicians, experts in encryption and decryption, and intelligence analysts.

It is CSE that provided crucial intelligence on threats to Canadian military personnel in theatre in Afghanistan. It is CSE that acts as Canada’s ears to the world.

It wears a couple of other hats too: guardian and protector of Government of Canada communications systems; and technical supporter of Canadian national security and law enforcement agencies when they act under judicial warrants to conduct covert surveillance.

So why the name change?

In an email titled, UNCLASSIFIED, the agency’s media relations office suggests nothing’s changed. Ryan Foreman says the legal title of the organization was, and is, CSE.

However, in 2007, along came instructions for every federal department and agency to comply with what was a stricter branding measure.

“Under the Federal Identity Program, which requires all federal departments and agencies to have the word ‘Canada’ as part of their corporate title, the word ‘Canada’ was added to create the agency’s applied title, the Communications Security Establishment Canada, or CSEC,” Foreman wrote.

He said the “applied” title is all that changed and the legal title remains Communications Security Establishment.

The change started to appear in the past six months, matching CSE’s URL, which had never changed to pick up the Canada word mark.

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So that is as clear as mud. Asked what do CSEC, er, CSE agents call it now over coffee, at meetings in their swanky new $4-billion building, Foreman was, well, enigmatic.

“We use the two titles interchangeably.”