CNN: Editor’s note: Ronald Deibert is a professor of political science at the University of Toronto, where he is director of the Canada Centre for Global Security Studies and the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs. He is author of “Black Code: Inside the Battle for Cyberspace” (Signal/McClelland & Stewart, 2013).
(CNN) — In 2011, I was on a panel, organized by the security company RSA, with two retired National Security Agency directors, Michael Hayden and Kenneth Minihan. During the course of our debate, I raised concerns, as the only non-American on the panel, that their plans and preferences for having the NSA secure cyberspace for the rest of us were not exactly reassuring. To this, Minihan replied that I should not describe myself as “Canadian” but rather “North American.”
As jarring as his response was, the fact of the matter is when it comes to communications, he’s right. Practically speaking, there is no border separating Canadian from U.S. telecommunications — though that’s not true the other way around. Primarily, this one-way dependence is a product of history and economics. Canadians’ communications are inextricably connected to networks south of the border and subject to the laws and practices of the U.S. over which we, as foreigners, have no say or control.
Categories: Americas, United States