Shock after Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov shot dead

A few hours after going on the radio to denounce President Vladimir Putin's policies as mad, charismatic opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was gunned down late Friday as he walked near the Kremlin.

Colleagues in Russia's beleaguered and marginalized opposition pointed fingers at the state or at assailants fired up by fervent nationalist sentiment in state-controlled news media. But Putin and other Russian politicians suggested the brazen attack was a provocation against the state.

Nemtsov, 55, was shot around 11:40 p.m. while walking with a female companion — a Ukrainian citizen — on a bridge over the Moscow River about 400 metres from the Kremlin. Russia's Investigative Committee said at least seven shots were fired.

Opposition leader Boris Nemtsov has been an outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters)

Nemtsov was to have been a prominent participant in a march planned for Sunday in a Moscow to protest Russia's policies in Ukraine, where the West alleges the Kremlin has provided troops and equipment to separatist rebels, and the economic crisis sparked by Western sanctions over Ukraine and the plunge in oil prices.

Organizers cancelled the march and said they would seek permission to hold a mourning rally for Nemtsov on Sunday. City authorities had made no decision on that by midday.

Through the morning, hundreds of people came to the site of Nemtsov's death to lay flowers. One Moscow resident, identified only as Vera, said she was shocked at hearing news of the killing.

"There is lawlessness that is spreading in our country," she told Reuters Sunday. "I myself lost two young people in the 1990s. And now — you see, near the Kremlin walls. It is lawlessness, a nightmare. Nightmare, nightmare, nightmare. I didn't sleep all night, I don't know how one can live in this type of country. Even though I didn't like him much — maybe didn't know something — but now I'm in shock, I'm in shock."

Medics carry the body of Nemtsov, who was shot dead on while walking a bridge near the Kremlin. (Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

Another man who brought flowers to the makeshift memorial site, who gave his name as Alexander, said the shooting appears intended as a message to others.

"Because, for me it is a symbol of a person who was fighting against the current regime, who was always honest and I see this as an action aimed at terrorizing people," he said. "I want to say that we are not afraid. I think we need to pay our respect to him. It's just the beginning, and the least I can do is at least bring some flowers."

Harper praises 'fearless advocate of democracy'

Prime Minister Stephen Harper released a statement late Friday, calling the murder a "shameful act of violence."

"I was shocked and saddened to learn of the murder of leading Russian opposition figure and former deputy prime minister Boris Nemtsov," Harper said.

"Mr. Nemtsov will be remembered as a fearless advocate of democracy, human rights and the rule of law in Russia. A leader unafraid to voice essential truths, even in the face of violent intimidation, he was also a prominent opponent of Russia's aggression in Ukraine and the illegal occupation of Crimea," he said in the statement.

Nemtsov has been detained by Russian police on multiple occasions. Here is seen surrounded by riot police during a demonstration in 2011. (Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images)

Nemtsov was working on a report presenting evidence that he believed proved Russia's direct involvement in the separatist rebellion that has raged in eastern Ukraine since April. Moscow denies backing the rebels with troops and sophisticated weapons.

Putin ordered Russia's top law enforcement chiefs to personally oversee the investigation of Nemtsov's killing.

"Putin noted that this cruel murder has all the makings of a contract hit and is extremely provocative," presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in remarks carried by Russian news agencies.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Nemtsov committed his life to a more democratic Russia, "and to strong relationships between Russia and its neighbours and partners, including the United States."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel praised Nemtsov's courage in criticizing Kremlin policies, and urged Putin to insure that the killers are brought to justice, her spokesman Steffen Seibert said.

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev echoed the suggestion that the killing was a provocation. "It's an attempt to push the situation into complications, maybe even to destabilizing the situation in the country," he was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov agreed. "It's a provocation; for big fires, sacrificial figures are necessary," Interfax quoted him as saying.

Critical of corruption, Ukraine policy

Nemtsov frequently assailed the government's inefficiency, rampant corruption and Ukraine policy.

Nemtsov on Putin's strategy13:22

In an interview with the Sobesednik newspaper, Nemtsov said earlier this month that his 86-year old mother was afraid that Putin could have him killed. Asked if he had such fears himself, he responded: "If I were afraid I wouldn't have led an opposition party."

Speaking on radio just a few hours before his death, he accused Putin of plunging Russia into crisis by his "mad, aggressive and deadly policy of war against Ukraine."

Nemtsov's lawyer, Vadim Prokhorov, said the politician had received threats on social networks and told police about them, but authorities took no steps to protect him.

Interior Ministry spokeswoman Yelena Alexeyeva told reporters that Nemtsov was walking with a female acquaintance, a Ukrainian citizen, when a vehicle drove up and unidentified people shot him. The woman wasn't hurt and was being questioned by police.

Russia 'rolling into the abyss'

Kasyanov, the former prime minister, said he was shocked.

"In the 21st century, a leader of the opposition is being demonstratively shot just outside the walls of the Kremlin!" Kasyanov told reporters as Nemtsov's body, placed in a plastic bag, was removed on a rainy and cold night, as the Kremlin bells chimed nearby. "The country is rolling into the abyss."

"This is a monstrous tragedy and a loss for us all," Alexei Navalny, Russia's most prominent opposition figure, said on his Facebook page. He is currently on a 15-day jail sentence for handing out leaflets without authorization.

Garry Kasparov, a former chess champion who worked with Nemtsov to organize protests against Putin and now lives in the United States, said the killing shows that Putin and those who support him are lying when they say their popular support is strong.

A memorial began to take shape on Moskvoretsky bridge near St. Basil Cathedral soon after news broke that Boris Nemtsov had been shot and killed. (Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

"If you have 86 per cent support, why do you kill someone like Boris?" he said.

Opposition activist Ilya Yashin, who last spoke to Nemtsov two days before the killing, said he had no doubt that Nemtsov's murder was politically motivated.

"Boris Nemtsov was a stark opposition leader who criticized the most important state officials in our country, including President Vladimir Putin. As we have seen, such criticism in Russia is dangerous for one's life," Yashin said.

Nemtsov served as a regional governor and then a deputy prime minister in the 1990s and once was seen as a possible successor to Boris Yeltsin, Russia's first elected president. After Putin came to power in 2000, Nemtsov became one of his most vocal critics.

Nemtsov was widely liked for his good humour, larger-than-life character and quick wit, but he and other top opposition figures long have been purged from state television and steadily marginalized by the Kremlin.

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The McDonald's slump: Are golden days of golden arches over?

McDonald's has been making headlines lately, but for all the wrong reasons, sparking speculation that the golden years of the golden arches are over.

Food industry analysts don't think McDonald's will go the way of the Woolworth's lunch counter, but one of the most recognizable brands in the world, with 36,000 locations globally and 1,400 in Canada, is in decline and scrambling for a new strategy under new leadership.

"The biggest challenge McDonald's faces is remaining relevant as a generational retailer," said Canadian retail executive George Minakakis.

McDonald's warned in January that business would be weak in the first half of 2015 and said it would cut its annual construction budget to the lowest in more than five years as it opens fewer restaurants in struggling markets like the U.S., Japan and Australia. 

The company is scaling back openings in emerging markets like China and Russia, too.

The burger giant reported a 21 per cent drop in fourth-quarter earnings, faced a food-safety scandal in China and named a new CEO in January, tasked with finding a strategy to regain momentum. 

Don Thompson, who took the global helm in July 2012, is being succeeded by chief brand officer Steve Easterbrook on March 1. 

The Chipotle effect

The chain's problems are not as simple as a shift in food tastes and heightened health consciousness. 

McDonald's CEO Don Thompson is leaving the company at the end of February to be succeeded by chief brand officer Steve Easterbrook. (Adrees Latif/Reuters)

Shares in the fast-casual burger-and-fry chain Shake Shack, David to McDonald's Goliath, more than doubled in its first day of trading in January, in a pointed contrast with the lacklustre performance of McDonald's, whose shares are down 1.3 per cent over the past year.

The buzzword "millennials" is thrown around by analysts as a segment of consumers that can't be ignored. Younger restaurant goers tend to prefer customization over standardization.

Restaurants like Chipotle and the Freshii franchise in Canada let diners build their meal and customize orders, while promising fresher ingredients.

"There's been a shift in consumer preferences," said R.J. Hottovy, a restaurant analyst at investment management firm Morningstar. "People have moved towards healthier, fast-casual places like Chipotle and Panera."

Thompson started to roll out a customized "Create Your Taste" menu, but orders could take five to seven minutes, compared with just a couple of minutes for regular items, and it was panned by franchisees across the board.

The world's biggest hamburger chain is struggling to adapt to changing eating habits. "The quality of the burgers they serve is within their control," says restaurant analyst Howard Penney. (Gene Puskar/Associated Press)

While Thompson said the plan would allow McDonald's to become more like Chipotle and Subway by letting customers select sandwich toppings, Richard Adams, a former McDonald's franchisee who now consults current ones, said the reaction by franchisees has been "A chorus of No's."

The answer isn't in copying the customized meal approach of competitors, but by reducing the number of menu items and doing them better, franchise owners say.

"There's a younger consumer, but they eat burgers," said Howard Penney, managing director and restaurant analyst at Hedgeye Risk Management. "I don't think they have a millennial problem, they have a food problem."

Back to basics?

Struggling franchise owners are encouraging corporate to innovate by going back to basics.

More than 80 per cent of McDonald's restaurants are owned by entrepreneurs, individuals and families.

In the '60s, '70s and '80s if you could round up the capital to open a McDonald's franchise it was a licence to print money, according to CBC business commentator Michael Hlinka.

'Someone will figure it out. Someone will get the brand to a place that changes consumers' perception.' - Restaurant analyst Howard Penney

But today, while margins may be reasonable at McDonald's Corporate, franchisees operate restaurants with margins rarely exceeding three per cent, said Sylvain Charlebois, a professor of food distribution and policy at University of Guelph.

"Even operators who own more than one outlet struggle to increase margins due to mounting royalty fees," he said.

In interviews, franchisees and advisers to restaurant owners say they hope new CEO Easterbrook will shrink McDonald's growing menu to concentrate on burgers and fries. 

While most franchisees are reluctant to speak to the press, they offered blunt recommendations in a survey published in January by Janney Capital Markets analyst Mark Kalinowski.

Change is "moving too slow, let's bite the bullet," one survey respondent said.

They suggested dropping McCafe espresso drinks, which critics say don't sell enough to pay for the electricity used by the machines that make them.

Streamline the menu

They also want to cut the number of Happy Meal options and get rid of the hard-to-make McWraps and other poorly performing menu items.

Some analysts argue that marketing for McDonald's in-store experience should expand from targeting families to targeting younger, single millenials. (Katherine Holland/CBC)

"They need to commit to a more streamlined menu — reducing the menu options — fewer but more impactful items," said Hottovy.

This isn't the first time McDonald's has faced pressures like this.

"In 2002 and 2003 you'd be asking the exact same questions: Is it broken? Is it forever gone? Someone will figure it out. Someone will get the brand to a place that changes consumers' perception," said Penney.

In 2002, McDonald's was losing market share and shares were in serious decline. The company managed to implement a strategy that turned it around. 

Shake Shack model

But, the environment is different now.

"This might not be the worst they've ever faced, but the blueprint for recovery isn't what it was," said Hottovy.

Minakakis thinks the chain needs to target a wider segment of the population. "Simply an increase in traffic is key to long-term success," he said.

The Shake Shack model is one that is working to attract a wide, and younger, crowd.

Older fast food chains advertise on TV while Shake Shack has taken to social media, according to a report by Goldman Sachs. The company is appealing to a younger customer base and developing a strong following online.

It has far more followers on Instagram relative to its size than McDonald's, Taco Bell and KFC.

The burger chain markets cheaply via social media, and while it only operates around 70 locations worldwide, as the company grows and opens more locations, the demand is already there.

On mobile? See the tweet here. 

But the veterans aren't going anywhere.

"McDonald's will definitely come back. The question is, when? And who's going to do it?" said Penney. "The new CEO's got some work to do to change the perception of the food or the quality of the food. "We don't know yet what that plan is or what his time frame is."

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Was Ottawa shooter's Parliament Hill attack his Plan B?

As MPs debate a major piece of anti-terrorism legislation presented partly as a response to the Oct. 22 shootings on Parliament Hill, Canadians still know relatively little about what lay behind that attack.

Certainly, the federal government seems content to have a certain view of gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau's motivations prevail: that he was a conventional jihadi terrorist inspired by, and perhaps in direct communication with, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, also known as ISIS.

One key piece of evidence that might clear up some of the questions about Zehaf-Bibeau's thinking is a video he recorded before his death.

Initially, RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson said the video would "certainly someday be released," and that he was inclined to do so "as soon as possible."

A few weeks later, his view had changed. "We may look at releasing some aspects of the transcript of the video. But I don't know that we will be releasing the video," Paulson said in November.

Now, a committee of MPs has invited Paulson to testify about the video's contents at his earliest convenience.

What do we know?

A day after the attack, Paulson mused about the gunman's motivation.

"I think the passport figured prominently in his motives. I'm not inside his head, but I think the passport was central to what was driving him."

Paulson's words have been echoed by a number of other people who knew Zehaf-Bibeau. They paint a picture of a man who was considering two mutually exclusive plans of action. One was a plan of emigration and the start of a new life; the other, an attack on Parliament that would surely have ended any hope of leaving the country.

Logic dictates that Zehaf-Bibeau could only carry out one of those two plans.

Interviews with people who spoke with him in the weeks before he shot and killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo at the National War Memorial suggest the attack was in fact his Plan B, one he began to put in motion on Oct. 2, 20 days before he finally carried it out.

The passport failure

Oct. 2 is the day Zehaf-Bibeau arrived in Ottawa from Vancouver. Tellingly, before even finding a place to stay, he went straight to the Libyan embassy to apply for a passport.

Yousef Furgani, chargé d'affaires at the Libyan Embassy in Ottawa, met Zehaf-Bibeau on Oct. 2 when he walked in and asked to renew his expired Libyan passport. (CBC photo)

"He said he had family in Libya," Yousef Furgani, first secretary of the Libyan Embassy, told CBC News in October. "He said he missed them, and he wanted to go back and live there."

Zehaf-Bibeau had told many people over the years about his desire to emigrate to Libya, where he had gone to live as a teenager with his father following his parents' separation.

At least as far back as 2007, when Zehaf-Bibeau worked building tunnels in Squamish, B.C., Libya was on his mind. His foreman in Squamish remembers: "He said he wanted to settle down there and find a wife."

Zehaf-Bibeau was also already showing signs of interest in jihadi ideology, sharing videos of Taliban attacks on his cellphone, although his co-workers didn't take him too seriously.

The fact that much of Libya is now under the control of Islamist militias — and even a Libyan franchise of ISIS — may suggest it's all a moot point. Today, an aspiring jihadi might find Libya almost as attractive as Syria, where the RCMP initially, and incorrectly, suggested Zehaf-Bibeau was planning to travel.

But Zehaf-Bibeau's Libyan longings predated the arrival of jihadi groups in Libya. He seems to have been no less interested in moving there when the country was under the control of the Ghadhafi family.

Escape from addiction

According to people who spoke with Zehaf-Bibeau, Libya seems to have become more than just the happy land of his youth — it was also a potential refuge from a worsening crack addiction.

Years before the Parliament Hill attack, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau told co-workers in Squamish, B.C., about his desire to move to Libya, and even began to wear the clothes of a Libyan tribal sheik.

After his arrival in Ottawa, he befriended Libyan-born Abdelkarim Abubakir, telling him the same thing he had told others at the shelter he frequented in Vancouver.

"He just wanted to go out from here, because the temptation from the drug is very strong, and he cannot resist it. That's his weakness. He wanted to go to Libya, he said," Abubakir told CBC News.

"So that's why he tell me, 'I have a passport to be accepted, and I hope it's going to be accepted,' but then it was otherwise. So I think that's why he did it, because his hope was to get out of here."

Abubakir says Zehaf-Bibeau kept his plan to attack Parliament entirely to himself. But Abubakir now believes the idea was already formed when Zehaf-Bibeau arrived in Ottawa. "That was in his head, too," he says, "but only if he couldn't get the passport."

It didn't take long after Zehaf-Bibeau was rejected at the Libyan embassy to move on to Plan B — the attack that would shock the nation. Less than 48 hours after the Libyans turned him away, Zehaf-Bibeau was captured on surveillance cameras taking a tour of Parliament Hill.

Mixed motives

While politicians and the public have debated whether Zehaf-Bibeau was motivated more by ideology or by personal issues, the real answer may be both.

People who knew him have left little doubt that he supported jihadi groups openly and vocally.

But one thing is clear: as late as Oct. 2, Zehaf-Bibeau was pursuing a personal ambition that, had it succeeded, would have made the attack on Parliament Hill impossible.

Unlike their counterparts in France and Australia, the RCMP have been extremely tight-lipped about their investigation into recent terrorist attacks.

But when Paulson spoke 30 hours after the attack, he had already seen Zehaf-Bibeau's video and knew quite a bit about his movements. Tellingly, he did not say that Zehaf-Bibeau came to the nation's capital in order to stage an attack on Parliament.

"He was in town to deal with a passport issue," said Paulson.

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Why Canada isn't ready to talk about ‘3-parent’ babies

A British parliamentary decision to approve a controversial fertility procedure that would produce so-called "three-parent babies" has captured the imagination of people who believe it could save lives.

But experts say that a fear about "designer babies" and the strict laws that govern reproductive technology in Canada have had a chilling effect on any discussion here about the procedure.

"I think part of the problem is that potential punishments are so severe that it scares people off," says Sara Cohen, a Toronto fertility lawyer.

"There's no conversation about this, there's none," Cohen said. "We're talking about a really significant topic medically. I think at the very least we should be having a conversation about it."

On Feb. 3, the U.K. parliament voted in favour of allowing clinical trials for Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy (MRT), which would prevent mothers who carry a specific type of Mitochondrial disease from passing it on to their newborns.

Dr. Mark Tarnopolsky, a medical professor at McMaster University in Hamilton and an expert on the disease, says the decision gives hope to mothers who carry it.

"These women have a potentially fatal disease," Tarnopolsky says. "They essentially have a Sword of Damocles hanging over their head with this disorder, where if they have a fairly high burden of the disorder, they are likely to pass it on to every subsequent offspring."

The two MRT procedures

Mitochondrial disease refers to a group of disorders affecting the mitochondria, which are tiny structures located within almost all cells of the body. The mitochondria act as the powerhouse of the cell by converting food and oxygen into energy.

According to MitoCanada, an organization that supports Canadians who suffer from the disease, 1 in 5,000 people have some form of it.

Treatment for the disease is limited and no known cure exists. Most children who have the disease do not live longer than their mid-teens.

The cause of the disease is a genetic mutation in the mitochondria itself. The mutation causes the mitochondria to stop producing energy, and when mitochondria cannot produce energy, cells fail and in turn the body's organs can fail, causing death.

Since 2008, scientists in the U.K. have researched two procedures to prevent this mutation from being passed on to newborns.​

One procedure involves removing the nucleus from an embryo containing the mutated mitochondria and transferring it to a donor embryo containing healthy mitochondria. The embryo is then implanted in the mother's uterus.

This graphic shows an embryo repair procedure where the DNA, or nucleus, of the embryo comes from the parents, while the cell and mitochondria come from the female donor. (CBC)

The other procedure is similar but involves transferring the nucleus from the mother's unfertilized egg to a donor's egg containing healthy mitochondria.​ The embryo is then fertilized and implanted in the mother's uterus.

This graphic shows how the DNA, or nucleus, of the mother's egg can be put into the egg of the female donor, who has healthy mitochondria. This creates an egg with the mother's DNA that is free of mitochondrial disease. (CBC)

​

Babies born from this procedure inherit 99.9 per cent of their DNA from the parents, with the other 0.1 per cent coming from the donor, according to a report from the U.K.-based think tank Wellcome Trust.

Legal concerns

At present, MRT remains illegal in Canada, under the Assisted Human Reproduction Act.

Passed in 2004, the legislation states no person can knowingly "alter the genome of a cell of a human being or in vitro embryo such that the alteration is capable of being transmitted to descendants."

It also states that any person found guilty of breaking the law can face fines of up to $500,000, or a jail sentence of up to 10 years, or both.

Because of this, many in Canada's scientific community want to take a wait-and-see approach with the British ruling, says Dr. Neal Mahutte, president of the Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society.

"Let's see what the results show in the next five to 10 years," Mahutte said. "At some point, people might be confident enough to say, 'Well, maybe we should start doing that in other countries.'"

Mahutte does believe that most fertility clinics in Canada would want the government to review the legislation as a whole. He says research in the field has evolved rapidly since 2004 and some other aspects of the legislation may also need updating.

Mahutte also says that some difficulty exists in communicating this to Health Canada, the ministry responsible for administering the legislation. This is partly because the ministry has been slow to reorganize ever since being given responsibility for the legislation in 2012.

"It's still very difficult to put forth any questions when they come up," Mahutte said.

The 'designer baby' fears

A specific ethical concern may also explain why the topic receives little discussion.

According to Health Canada's website, altering the genetic code of an embryo was made illegal to prevent so-called "designer babies." This term refers to babies created to have "specific genetic traits that the intended parent(s) consider to be desirable."

Video: MRT procedure

'3-parent' fertility treatment2:45

"I think the reality of what they're doing in the U.K. is so far removed from that," Mahutte says. "The mitochondrial DNA do not code for any traits at all."

Cohen feels that government tried to calm public fears that science would one day give parents the option of creating designer babies by outlawing any altering of the genetic code.

"We legislated before we were even there," Cohen said. "We legislated in concern of the potential of the worst possible science-fiction outcome that could exist one day."

Although provisions of the legislation may have discouraged debate on MRT, Tarnopolsky believes a dialogue about it will eventually begin in Canada.

"When a sophisticated first-world country like the U.K. deems this appropriate to move forward, I see no reason why that dialogue should not be open, and open soon, in Canada."

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Image of 'Jihadi John' as adult emerges

The first photo to emerge of "Jihadi John" as an adult shows the 26-year-old British ISIS militant as a student at the University of Westminister in London.

The photo, from student records, shows Mohammed Emwazi with a moustache and goatee and wearing a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball cap. He was enrolled as a full-time student at the Cavendish campus from 2006 to 2009.

The unmasking of the ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria) militant as a Londoner who had repeatedly been questioned by security services sent shock waves through Britain Friday, with Prime Minister David Cameron stepping in to defend British spy craft.

Cameron tried to defuse criticism of Britain's intelligence community, which had "Jihadi John" on its list of potential terror suspects for years but was unable to prevent him from travelling to Syria, where he has played a prominent role in grisly beheading videos.

Cameron did not mention "Jihadi John" or refer to his real identity: Mohammed Emwazi, a Kuwait-born computer science graduate raised and educated in Britain. But he said the country's spies make "incredibly difficult judgments" daily about how to pursue threats to national security and have broken up plots that would have caused immense damage.

At the University of Westminster, where Emwazi studied computer science, administrators told students if they had any "concerns" about the news of his involvement in jihad they should call an advice line.

On MI5's radar since 2009

Emwazi had been known to MI5, the British intelligence services, since at least 2009, initially in connection with investigations into terrorism in Somalia.

The black-clad man in still image taken from an ISIS video has been identified as Mohammed Emwazi, a Kuwait-born, London-raised computer graduate in his mid-20s. (CBC)

David Anderson, who is in charge of reviewing Britain's terrorism legislation, said intelligence agencies may have dropped the ball, but faced a big challenge to identify real threats from "hundreds, probably thousands" of suspects.

"Perhaps they did slip up in this case but one won't know until there's been an inquiry or a report of some kind," he told the BBC.

The case has some parallels to that of two al-Qaeda-inspired extremists who murdered a British soldier in a London street in May 2013. A report by legislators concluded that delays and other failings by the agencies had contributed to that tragedy.

However, it is not clear what laws could have been used to prevent Emwazi from leaving Britain at the time, since he had not been charged with any terrorist-related offences. It is not known if police or security services had any evidence he was planning to join extremists in Syria.

Masked image in ISIS videos

His identification as the front man in ISIS murder videos has raised questions about how a soccer-playing London youngster who liked smart clothes became one of the world's most wanted men.

Authorities were working to piece together the path to radicalization of Emwazi, who came to Britain from Kuwait as a small child and attended state schools in London before studying computer science at the University of Westminster.

Court documents from 2011 obtained by the BBC list Emwazi as part of a network of west London men suspected by MI5 of sending funds, equipment and recruits to al-Shabaab militants in Somalia. The group included Bilail al-Berjawi, a Lebanese-British militant who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Somalia in January 2012.

Emails that Emwazi sent to a Muslim advocacy group reveal a young man increasingly frustrated by the attentions of British spies and angry at the plight of Muslims around the world.

Emwazi approached the group, CAGE, after he and two friends were arrested and deported on a trip to Tanzania in August 2009. They said they were going on a post-university safari. But Emwazi said he was grilled by a British intelligence officer who accused him of trying to travel to Somalia to link up with terrorists there.

He said the agent, who identified himself as Nick, suggested Emwazi "work for us" before saying "life will be harder for you" if he did not cooperate.

Rattled by MI5 recruitment efforts

It is clear that Emwazi was unnerved after his unwanted interrogation.

"He knew everything about me; where I lived, what I did, the people I hanged around with," he wrote in one of the emails that CAGE made public Thursday. "He even said that he would try to visit me. But I refused and told him that I did not want him to pay me a visit."

The following year Emwazi accused British agents of preventing him from going to Kuwait, where he had a job and planned to marry. He wrote in one email that his "`life' is kind of on a `pause."'

Like many British Muslims who have become radicalized in recent years, he seemed to feel that Muslims were increasingly under attack in many parts of the world and complained to CAGE of the plight of his fellow believers in Chechnya, Iraq and elsewhere.

CAGE said that Emwazi even changed his name in a bid to escape the attentions of the security services, but still was barred from going to Kuwait. His family reported him missing early in 2013. Four months later, police told them Emwazi was in Syria, CAGE said.

He appeared in a video released in August showing the slaying of American journalist James Foley, denouncing the West before the killing. A man with similar stature and voice was also featured in videos of the IS killings of American journalist Steven Sotloff, Britons David Haines and Alan Hemming, and U.S. aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig.

Foley's parents in Arizona on Thursday expressed surprise that "Jihadi John" was an educated man who had real prospects in life.

'We need to forgive him for not having a clue what he was doing.'- Mother of slain U.S. hostage James Foley

"So he, in a sense, had a privileged upbringing, so to me that makes that even more sad that he'd want to use his gifts for such evil and such hatred. It's very frightening to me," Diane Foley said.

"We need to forgive him for not having a clue what he was doing," she said.

The widow of Haines, a British aid worker, said Friday she would like to see "Jihadi John" captured and put on trial.

Dragana Haines told The Associated Press in a phone interview from her home in Croatia that "I really hope he will be caught, I think it would be a good lesson for all."

Haines, whose husband was killed in September, said she would rather see Emwazi judged in a court of law than killed by enemy action.

"People of his kind believe that death in combat is an honour, something special," she said.

Family in west London

In the modest west London neighbourhood where Emwazi's family lived, citizens were shocked after his identify was revealed.

Sharaft Ullah, who worships at the Harrow Road Mosque near the family home, remembered Emwazi as a strict Muslim who prayed several times a day. He said Emwazi was "a very good local guy and polite with everybody."

"I feel angry because he was educated in this country and he graduated from Westminster," Ullah said. "If he has been doing these things it's wrong."

Another mosque that Emwazi was reported to have attended, the Greenwich Islamic Centre, said it had no knowledge of him.

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'Not just wilting violets': Why young women join ISIS

Young women who become radicalized and make the trip to ISIS-controlled lands are motivated by the same reasons as male recruits, including a sense of adventure and a desire to right perceived wrongs in the Muslim world, according to experts.

When they arrive they are usually quickly married to a fighter with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and begin a strictly controlled domestic life of child-rearing, cooking and cleaning.

Much of this indoctrination takes places through social media, including on Twitter, as the teenagers speak with female recruiters who have already made the journey and offer advice on what to bring and who to contact once they arrive in a neighbouring country like Turkey.

"It offers them a sense of adventure, which is not only the voyage — which is an allure itself — but also these romantic notions that upon arrival you will be paired," says Erin Saltman, who leads the women and extremism program at the International Strategic Dialogue in London.

Six young Quebecers left Canada in January to join militants in Syria, including at least two women. Three British teen girls flew to Turkey last week in an apparent bid to join ISIS.

Although some women, particularly those from the minority Iraqi Yazidi group, are sold into sexual slavery, young Western women are treated differently, Saltman says.

"But it's not to say that once they're married husbands aren't abusive or forcing themselves on them," Saltman says.

They are heavily restricted and unable to leave the house without their new husbands. They have little chance of escape, she says, many having turned over their passports when they arrive as a sign of allegiance to ISIS.

The International Strategic Dialogue released a report last month on the radicalization of western women, which was based primarily on statements made through social media accounts. 

It found that the women who travelled alone appeared to be motivated by three primary reasons: the perceived oppression of Muslim people, a desire to create an ideologically pure state and a personal religious duty to assist in the process.   

'Idealized utopia'

Saltman says about 550 women from western countries have travelled to ISIS-controlled territories, including about 70 from France and another 50 from the U.K.

Although some young women may be shocked at the living conditions, particularly in war-torn areas, most young women who have become radicalized to the point of leaving their families and homes have a pretty good idea of what they are getting into, she says.

"They're not just wilting violets," Saltman says.

Mia Bloom, author of Bombshell: Women and Terrorism, says online recruiters will tout the alleged benefits of living in ISIS territories, claiming they will become part of a sisterhood with many like-minded friends.

"They're trying to sell this idea that it's a very idealized utopia," she says.

The online recruiter will often discredit the reported atrocities of ISIS by saying that the media is biased.

"Like the sexual pedophile, they are creating rapport, building trust, creating an environment of secrecy, you know, 'let's not tell anybody,'" says Bloom, who also teaches security studies at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell.

They can also provide tips on how to leave the country, including what to pack, what to wear, and how to avoid suspicion with security, as well as sometimes providing financial help for purchasing plane tickets. Similar information can also be found on websites.

CBC News reported earlier this week that one young woman travelled to Syria after apparently becoming radicalized. Her sister says she was recruited under the guise of an online class to study the Qur'an taught by a woman in Edmonton.

Not told specifics

ISIS has become particularly adept at using social media as a recruitment tool, particularly for young people, experts say.

In Spain, four people were arrested Tuesday in what police say was a sophisticated social media campaign designed to lure women to join extremist groups like ISIS.

Bloom says the women are usually told to simply fly to a country like Turkey and then to get in contact with a particular person who can ultimately take them to ISIS-controlled territories.

She says the women are intentionally not told about specifics of the plan so that if they are caught in transit they can't provide detailed information on the route they would have taken to get into Syria.

Three teenagers from Denver were arrested last October in Germany, for example, in an apparent attempt to join ISIS militants. 

'Second generation'

Young women are specifically targeted largely so that they can be married off as a reward to extremist fighters.

"It's a way in which you ensure these foreign fighters aren't going to turn around and leave if they get disillusioned or they get sick and tired of living in Syria," Bloom says, "because they know they have a house, the wife, the kid, they're sticking around."

It is also part of state-building efforts on the part of ISIS, Saltman says.

"Now that they have this territory, the secondary aim is to actually build a state and you need women to create the second generation of this state," she says. 

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#TheDress colour question divides an internet

CBC News Posted: Feb 27, 2015 3:07 AM ET Last Updated: Feb 27, 2015 9:17 AM ET

The internet took off like a runaway llama on Thursday night when one Tumblr user posted a picture of a dress, asking: Is this dress white and gold, or blue and black?

On its website, Roman Originals describes their royal blue dress as "bang on trend." They got that right. (Roman Originals)

The #TheDress phenomenon divided households, friends and colleagues and soon overwhelmed the Tumblr user who posed the original question.

It sparked opinions from far and wide. Celebrities like Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga weighed in. Marketing geniuses capitalized on the viral trend with #TheDress-themed tweets.

Even professional sports teams, such as the Minnesota Vikings, were talking about this dress.

In the end, though, it appears that #TeamBlackAndBlue has prevailed. The dress is from Roman Originals, and it doesn't come in #whiteandgold. 

On mobile? Click here to see our full roundup of opinions.

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Forget payday loans: Instalment loans the new high-interest debt

At a time when she should be approaching her golden years, 57-year-old grandmother Helen Parry is instead supporting two adult children on a wage that hasn't increased in eight years.

"Cost of living rises but the pay doesn't and the utilities and everything goes up … so it gets harder each year," Parry says.

Last year, with bills piling up, Parry, who lives in Brampton, Ont., asked her bank for a loan but was turned down because of bad credit.  

Instalment loans, which are relatively new to Canada, carry rates of interest that can be considered extreme. Offered by companies such as easyfinancial Services Ltd., the loans carry an effective annual interest rate of almost 60 per cent. (CBC)

She turned to a company called easyfinancial Services Ltd. 

"I was relieved because, you know, I didn't have any other option at the time." 

She got a loan of $3,100 to be paid back over 18 months. But in doing so, Parry dove into one the fastest growing — and potentially most expensive — types of debt in Canada.

They're called Instalment loans. They are, in a nutshell, unsecured, high-interest, subprime, short-term loans.

A hidden-camera investigation by CBC Marketplace is helping expose just how costly these loans can be.

Unlike payday loans, which are usually for a few hundred dollars and repaid in a few weeks, instalment loans allow you to borrow up to $15,000 with repayment periods of up to three years.

But like payday loans, instalment loans are aimed at the same general market: people with bad debts and poor credit.  They often have lower incomes, are struggling to get by and are less sophisticated financially.

In fact, some purveyors of instalment loans are literally setting up shop in many of the same depressed neighbourhoods once populated by payday lenders.

A slippery slope

Easyfinancial Services Ltd. is taking over 47 retail locations across Canada from The Cash Store, an Edmonton-based payday lender that went out of business after it was barred from making new loans in Ontario because of rules limiting interest charges.

Helen Parry borrowed $5,100 from easyfinancial Services, to be paid back over three years. But according to the terms of the loan, including interest and insurance, she would have ended up repaying $13,400. (CBC)

While not as high as payday loans, instalment loans also carry rates of interest that can be considered extreme.

Take Parry. A few months after she got her original loan, she got a call from easyfinancial offering her more money with a longer repayment period. Parry agreed and ended up with a $5,100 loan to be repaid over 36 months. Her semimonthly payment was $186.82, which includes an optional loan-protection Insurance payment of $55.97.

Parry's loan agreement has the total cost of borrowing expressed as an annual percentage rate (APR) of 46.96 per cent. 

But Peter Gorham, an actuary who provides certification on criminal rates of interest, calculated Parry's effective annual interest rate to be 57.12 per cent.

"The criminal interest rate is anything over 60 per cent," says Gorham. "They're very close."

Easyfinancial told Parry the total obligation for the term of the loan would be $9,521.90. But under the Consumer Protection Act, easyfinancial only has to include the principal plus interest in the cost-of-borrowing disclosure.

If you include the insurance payment, by the end of 36 months, Parry would have repaid a total of more than $13,400. 

Legally, insurance payments aren't included in interest calculations,but if you were to take those into account, Gorham says, the effective annual interest rate would be 120.3 per cent.

Customers often don't understand

A former easyfinancial employee, who did not want her identity revealed, told Marketplace easyfinancial's customers often don't comprehend the cost of borrowing.

Marketplace investigated how up-front easyfinancial Services is about the real costs of its loans. Instalment loans are one of the fastest growing kinds of debt in Canada. (CBC)

"I don't think anyone really understood. All they wanted was the money and they wanted it quick. And then you pay and you pay and you pay and you pay," says the former employee.

She says sales reps, who receive a commission, would call customers offering more money.

"You wouldn't finish paying off your first loan but you've made so many payments, now you qualify for more money. So you would add to that loan. Then you just roll it over."

She says it bothered her so much, she quit.

"I would come home every day very depressed. Like, just felt like we were stealing from people."

In a statement to Marketplace, easyfinancial executive vice-president Jason Mullins said "Ninety-five per cent of our customers rate their experience with easyfinancial as good or excellent. Your story is relying on a few negative anecdotal examples that represent a small number of our customers."

A debt trap

Debt counsellors, though, say high interest rates and refinancing options like those offered by easyfinancial can be devastating.

"For many people, they get stuck in this cycle not for just years but decades," says Scott Hannah, president and CEO of Credit Counselling Society.

Instalment loans have been around in the U.S. for decades but they are relatively new to Canada. 

And yet, Equifax, a credit monitoring company, says instalment loans are the second fastest growing type of debt in Canada, behind only auto loans. Instalment loans now account for a total of $132 billion owed, or 8.7 per cent of Canada's total debt distribution.

The vast majority of that is held by the big banks.

Alternative lenders say their share of the instalment loan business is about $2.5 billion in Canada.

Numbers game

Vancouver-based Urloan, one of those lenders, was offering on its website a $15,000 loan payable in 36 monthly instalments of $858.80.

"I analyzed that loan and determined that the effective annual interest rate that's contained in that particular arrangement is 71.26 per cent," actuary Jay Jeffrey says.

Urloan says that was a mistake.  

​"The ​calculator on our website is definitely wrong," says Ali Pourdad, president and CEO of Creditloans Canada Financing Ltd., the parent company of Urloan. "I think you discovered a much higher payment than we actually charge."

Pourdad says Urloan's loans have an APR of 46.9 per cent, which he says equates to an effective annual interest rate of 58.5 per cent, just below the legal limit of 60 per cent.

"Yeah, they're high," says Pourdad.

"Unfortunately, we have to charge these rates. It's nothing to do with 59.9, 59.8, it's the fact that we're taking an immense amount of risk. And also, we have to borrow at higher rates because we're a high-risk lender."

Other options

Pourdad says his company is helping people who wouldn't qualify for a bank loan, by getting them out of financial trouble through consolidating debt.

​"They're going from not paying bills to paying them off. That's where we come in," says Pourdad.

But critics say consolidating debts into one — often higher-interest — loan is not usually the best way to go.

"If they fall behind on these loans, the consolidation loans, it's just like falling behind on any other loan, you'll eventually be pursued for the balance and get calls from collection agencies," says John Lawford, of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre.

It's better, Lawford says, to go to a credit counselling service, which can often negotiate a lower interest rate. 

That's what Parry did. 

Unable to make the payments on her loan from easyfinancial, she went to Credit Canada Debt Solutions. 

They got her a new interest rate for her instalment loan: 9.99 per cent. 

That, she says, is a rate she can afford. 

---

Watch the Marketplace investigation into Uneasy Money Friday at 8 p.m. on CBC Television.

If you have a consumer issue, contact aaron.saltzman@cbc.ca

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Obama's problem with the words 'Islamic extremists': Neil Macdonald

A few days after the 9/11 attacks, George W. Bush began repeating what would become a mandatory presidential preamble.

"The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam," he declared, then quoted from the Qur'an to make that case: "In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil.

"Islam," Bush concluded, "is peace."

For the rest of his time as president, Bush was careful to use similar language in his denunciations of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. And when Barack Obama took over, he used an identical set of talking points.

Last week, speaking to a gathering of some 60 countries about the need to counter and destroy ISIS, the jihadist group running amok in Iraq and Syria, Obama couched his message in the same Islam-is-peace language, fishing out another quote from Islam's sacred text: "The Qur'an says whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind."

Obama, in fact, goes even further than Bush did. To the annoyance of his critics, this president conspicuously avoids in his descriptions of ISIS and al-Qaeda any adjectives pertaining to their declared religious motivation.

Obama will not speak the words "Islamic," and "extremist" in the same breath. He will not use "Islamist," or even "jihadist."

Why Obama and some other Western leaders frame their rhetoric that way is obvious.

They want to shield law-abiding Muslim citizens from popular anger as provocations grow more atrocious by the month. Plus, they are anxious to repudiate any idea of a war between the largely Christian West and the Islamic world.

But that is the way ISIS and its fellow travellers see things, and those atrocities — the immolation of the Jordanian pilot in the name of Allah, the internet videos of hooded figures hacking the heads off Western hostages in the name of Allah, the slaughter at a French magazine in the name of Allah — are having the desired effect.

It's pretty safe to say that in the broad public mind, both here and in Europe, Islam is not synonymous with peace.

Terri Crippes, left, and Lori Lyon, are the maternal aunts of Kayla Mueller, a 26-year-old American woman who had been held by Islamic State militants and was confirmed dead earlier this month. (The Associated Press)

And hovering above all the reassurances that the vast majority of Muslims reject religious extremism is the question of why so many violent religious extremists today are Muslims.

An answer, of sorts, is provided in a recent disquisition in The Atlantic, one of the oldest and most respected magazines in America.

The author, Graeme Wood, argues that whatever you might think of ISIS, it is following Qur'anic dictates.

The quotes extracted by George W. Bush and Obama do exist in the Qur'an, but so do plenty of others that are anything but peaceful.

A broader narrative

"Muslims can say that slavery is not legitimate now, and that crucifixion is wrong at this historical juncture," writes Wood. "Many say precisely this. But they cannot condemn slavery or crucifixion outright without contradicting the Qur'an and the example of the Prophet."

Wood argues that this limitation is what prevents many Muslims from speaking out against hardline Islamists.

The article is exhaustive, deeply researched, and quotes not just doctrinaire jihadists, but a widely respected Islamic scholar at Princeton University, as well as some of ISIS's supporters.

British Prime Minister David Cameron is one of those allies not avoiding the term 'Islamic extremism.' He deployed it again as recently as this week when talking about the three British school girls trying to make their way to Syria. (The Associated Press)

And it's provoking a public discussion here — on both the U.S. left and right — that a good many Americans have clearly been itching to have.

Reading the text of President Obama's speeches these past weeks, one suspects he read The Atlantic article, too, and that he's anxious to retain control over any such discussion.

Al-Qaeda and ISIS "draw selectively from the Islamic texts," Obama argues.

Having said that, though, he does concede there is "a broader narrative that does exist in many Muslim communities around the world that suggests the West is at odds with Islam in some fashion. Or that we are the cause of every ill in the Middle East."

That's not the case, the president said, adding that Muslim leaders, including scholars and clerics, need to do more to push back.

Basically, he was saying, if you aren't part of the solution, well … the conclusion is obvious.

Denunciations

Mainstream Western Muslim groups, one suspects, probably think they've already been as clear as they need to be about violence in the name of their God. And the conclusions in The Atlantic article are even less welcome.

Jerusha Tanner Lamptey, a professor of Islam and ministry at Union Theological Seminary in New York, was quoted by the group ThinkProgress as saying Wood's article in The Atlantic effectively portrayed all Muslims as archaic, backward-minded literalists, unable to accommodate the modern world.

Of course, if the most sacred texts of Islam contain some pretty unpeaceful passages, so does the Bible. The book of Leviticus, for example, outright condones slavery. The Old Testament preaches against homosexuality, and some of the punishments it prescribes for sinners are as savage as ones dispensed by ISIS.

Obama himself has pointed out recently that Christians have committed deeply evil acts in the name of Jesus, citing in particular the Crusades and the horrors of the Inquisition. (For this he took heavy criticism from Christian leaders, who cried false equivalence.)

The point he seems to be making is that no religion "is peace," in and of itself. Most religions in fact have adherents capable of fundamentalist, violent interpretations. At this point in history, Islam seems to have the most ferocious ones.

In any event, pretending that the likes of ISIS and al-Qaeda and al-Shabaab have nothing whatever to do with Islam is unpersuasive. Would anyone argue that the Crusaders, who butchered Jews and Muslims with equal enthusiasm, had nothing whatever to do with Christianity?

Obama must know that his carefully laundered messaging is increasingly met with mockery. Even some Democrats are rolling their eyes.
Here in the U.S., a conversation is certainly under way about whether Islam, at least as practised in its birthplace, is as intrinsically peaceful as the two most recent American presidents have claimed.

It's going to be difficult to have this conversation without offending a lot of people, or exciting those nativists who have nurtured resentment and even hatred of Muslims since 9/11.

But it's taking place. The question is whether it can proceed sensibly.

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9 people reported dead in rural southwest Missouri

Nine people were found dead overnight in an apparent mass murder in rural southern Missouri, according to local media reports on Friday.

Eight people were thought to be victims of one suspect who was also found dead, according to a report from KSDK television. The nine dead were all found in and near the town of Tyrone, the TV station said. State police were to hold a news conference later in the morning.

The Texas County Sheriff's Office declined to comment on the reports but confirmed an investigation into the killings in multiple locations was ongoing.

The Houston-Herald newspaper reported that staff at area schools were told to arrive early to counsel students.

The killings took place in a thinly populated, rural part of the state, near the Mark Twain National Forest. The region is known to attract tourists for its hunting, camping, and river rafting.

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Man takes selfie video of Jaws of Life rescue from car crash

A B.C. man managed to video record his own rescue from a car crash as a crew cut him free of the wreckage with the Jaws of Life.

In his YouTube post, Andrew MacDonald said he was driving home from a night out in Victoria on Jan. 15 around 5:30 a.m. PT when he "blacked out" and drove straight into a pole near Duncan at 60 km/h.

"I was getting home real late, I was almost home. I guess I just blacked out and the next thing you know, I am in the ditch and the car is all mangled."

When he regained consciousness after the crash, he recorded the rescue crew cutting him out of the 1993 Honda Accord.

"The next thing you know, there are firefighters and stuff cutting the roof off. I still had my phone in my hands, so I called my brother and I was talking to him, so I just decided to start filming."

The sound of a saw ripping through metal and his conversation with the crew can be heard in the video as the crews work to free him.

In his YouTube post, he says he broke his right arm, left femur, both knee caps and both ankles. He also suffered a broken nose from the airbag, he wrote.

"Went for major surgery in Victoria which took total 14 hours over a couple days. Metal plates and screws all over. Spent a month in hospital. Only 1 hot nurse :| But I'm home now. And recovering quickly!" says the post.

MacDonald told CBC News he doesn't drink and RCMP did not recommend any charges in connection with the crash.

He also said he had never before fallen asleep at the wheel. 

He is expected to walk again, but it will take time. For now, he spends most of his time in a bedroom set up to cater to his medical needs.

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6 young Quebecers join jihadists in Syria: report

At least six young Quebecers from Laval and Montreal left the country in January to join militants in Syria, sources tell CBC/Radio-Canada.

According to early information, two of them appear to be young women from Laval, while at least one of the young men is from Montreal.

Some of those who left are students at Montreal CEGEP Collège de Maisonneuve.

"We've been informed about three yesterday and in fact, those three names — they were students in our college for the last [semester], but not this [semester]," said Brigitte Desjardins of Collège de Maisonneuve.

They reportedly flew out of Montreal-Trudeau international airport to Turkey as a path into Syria in mid-January.

Two days later, family members alerted the Montreal police department.

The file was quickly transferred to the RCMP, who would not comment on the ongoing investigation.

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In the Conservative war on terror, the first casualty is Parliament: Chris Hall

Fresh from limiting the parliamentary debate, at second reading, on its proposed anti-terror law, the government is now resisting opposition calls for an extensive review of Bill C-51 by the Commons committee on public safety and national security.

"This bill is strongly supported by Canadians," Stephen Harper argued this week during Question Period, "and I encourage the committee to study it as quickly as possible in order to adopt these measures to help Canadian security during the life of this Parliament."

What the prime minister bases his judgment of public support on isn't clear, though one opinion poll has suggested four out of five Canadians are in favour of giving Canada's spy agency and police broad new powers.

But public support, no matter how it's measured, is no substitute for public scrutiny.

The government's bill proposes to give Canada's spy agency broad new powers to disrupt suspected terrorist plots, to allow government departments to share private information more widely, and to allow suspects to be detained without charge for longer periods.

But critics say that these new powers, and overly broad definitions in the proposed law, represent a threat to Canadians' rights, without any commensurate increase in parliamentary or third-party oversight.

An election winner?

The Conservatives, on the other hand, say Canada has to respond to the October attacks in Canada that killed two Canadian soldiers, and to view these incidents as part of a trend that has seen brazen attacks in Paris and Copenhagen, and the arrest Thursday of alleged ISIS conspirators in New York City.

But that's only one of the motives. The party also considers public security a winning issue for them heading into an election, so much so that the government is determined to push this bill through with a minimum of parliamentary scrutiny and review.

As CBC News reported on Wednesday, the government is offering just three days for the committee to hear from witnesses, with one of those days devoted exclusively to questioning Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney and department officials.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair has criticized Bill C-51 for vague wording, which he says leaves the door open to spying on political opponents. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick)

The New Democrats and Liberals want much more time for witnesses. And will press their case again today when the committee meets to arrange a schedule.

"We're talking about the most significant changes to security legislation in this country since 2001," NDP Leader Tom Mulcair told reporters on Wednesday.

"Critical flaws are being revealed by security experts across the country every single day. It is reckless and irresponsible to ram it through without a full and proper study."

For the Conservatives, more witnesses equates to more criticism, and the possibility that the public support Harper talked about might begin to erode.

Getting it right

The alternative view is that the more public scrutiny, the more likely the government is to get a significant piece of this legislation right, which is to ensure that the appropriate balance is struck between security and individual liberties.

And there are no shortage of examples to support that view.

The most obvious is the 2001 review of the original anti-terrorism law introduced after the 9/11 attacks by the then Liberal government of Jean Chretien.

The Commons justice committee met 19 times between Oct. 18 and Nov. 26, 2001 to review the bill. A special committee of the Senate began parallel hearings, wrapping up on Dec. 6.

Both committees met twice-daily at one point to ensure the politicians — and public — heard from as many witnesses as possible.

Wayne MacKay, a constitutional law professor at Dalhousie University, appeared before both committees in 2001. He says the extensive testimony helped the government of the day refine the legislation.

"The more alternative views you hear, the better the legislation will be," MacKay said in an interview Wednesday. "This is another very significant piece of legislation and it's worthy of a detailed review."

With an election coming, the Canadian flag will be in demand. Here, Prime Minister Stephen Harper makes an announcement regarding tax cuts in Surrey, B.C., earlier this month. (The Canadian Press)

Don Stuart is a criminal law professor at Queen's University in Kingston. He also appeared before both committees in 2001, and says the Conservatives' approach to its anti-terror bill speaks more to political imperatives than security needs.

"The longer you go at committee, the more you hear opposing voices."

Lessons from the past

Stuart says there are elements of Bill C-51 that he believes are redundant, such as the new offence of promoting terrorism, or too vague, including the definition of terrorist activity.

In 2001, the Liberals accepted amendments to impose a five-year limit on the extraordinary new powers of preventative arrest and investigative hearings.

That bill, in its final form, withstood judicial scrutiny far better than either the U.S. Patriot Act or Britain's Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001.

This time, though, the Conservatives are showing no similar willingness to entertain amendments, even though that kind of obstinance has caused them political embarrassment before.

In 2011, the government tried to introduce a series of amendments to a mammoth crime bill at the last moment, amendments their own MPs had voted down earlier at committee simply because they had been proposed by Liberal MP Irwin Cotler.

It turned out the government actually agreed with Cotler's efforts and, proving imitation is the least sincere form of legislation, they copied nearly word for word Cotler's proposals to strengthen the right of victims to sue foreign states that supported or committed terrorist acts.

Here, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau delivers a speech during an event in Mississauga, Ont., on Feb. 15. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press)

It didn't work. The government's amendments were ruled out of order by House Speaker Andrew Scheer because they came too late in the legislative process.

In the end, the bill had to be amended in the Senate, and ended up mirroring what Cotler had proposed much earlier.

It's unlikely the Conservatives will now apply these past lessons as they push ahead with Bill C-51.

As the prime minister said, the goal is to have the new security measures in place before the House rises in June. Alongside a campaign message firmly embedded in the minds of voters before they head to the polls in October.

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Nude photo ban by Reddit, Google won't delete damage

The ban on sexual content that is posted online without consent – to be implemented by Reddit and Google in March – is an admirable effort, experts say, but they also paint a fairly bleak picture about its likely success at preventing further damage. 

The ban by Google's Blogger service and social-networking and news site Reddit takes aim at leaked or stolen nude photos and so-called revenge pornography — the posting of explicit images of former lovers.  

Beginning March 10, anyone who wants a Reddit image or video of themselves removed from Reddit can email the site (contact@reddit.com), but that doesn't mean it's gone.

Effective March 23, Blogger will no longer allow most nude photos to be posted on anything other than a private site.

"The internet has no delete button," said Carmi Levy, a technology analyst with voices.com, a tech company in London, Ont. So once something goes online chances are it's going to pop up elsewhere. It is very much like a game of whack-a-mole – trying to find out where else it popped up and trying to get ahead of it."

No permanent eraser

While a successful copyright complaint or email to Reddit could scrub images from one site forever, victims have to remain vigilant and continue filing takedown notices elsewhere on the web.

Reddit and Google are taking a tougher stance against nudity in an attempt to prevent their services from turning into online peep shows. (Robert Galbraith/Reuters)

"If you are a victim of having something posted about you against your will, there really isn't a whole lot you can do," Levy said. "You can't simply go online and look for photos of yourself. Unless it's properly tagged, you might never even know. It's a very frightening place to be."

Until now, Reddit has had a hands-off approach to privacy, largely allowing its 160 million users to police their own forums within certain guidelines such as no child pornography or spam. The change comes about six months after hackers obtained nude photos of Jennifer Lawrence and other celebrities and posted them to social media sites, including Reddit.

Reddit was initially criticized for leaving the images up and for its hands-off policy. The site also came under fire when Wired reported that Reddit made enough money off the stolen celebrity photos to keep its servers running for almost a month.

The company was applauded over Tuesday's announcement for taking a stand against revenge porn and the posting of nude photos without consent, which Jennifer Lawrence called a "sex crime." 

Levy said, "It's an admirable effort by both Reddit and Google to get ahead of a problem that has become very significant in recent years. Unfortunately, because of the way the internet is structured, it really is little more than wrapping paper."

Reddit called the move "one more step in the right direction," saying it would share how often these takedowns occur in its yearly privacy report.

"You shouldn't do it because it's good PR, you should be liable for the damages the victims will suffer," Dr. Avner Levin said. Levin is an associate professor at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University and chair of the law and business department.

Google's Blogger service is giving its users until March 23 to delete sexually explicit or 'graphic nude' images from their sites. (Adam Berry/Getty Images)

"That is what we have in terms of intellectual property. We should have a legal structure like that for people's private images."

Legislation passed by Parliament in October makes it illegal in Canada to circulate an intimate image without the subject's consent, but critics warn the law is too broad and vague.

"The big challenge is that with the provision of the intimate image there is a defence of whether the person being photographed had a reasonable expectation of privacy," Levin said. "What is the context of the photo taking? What was the expectation when the photo was taken and has it been breached?" 

Victims can still sue for defamation, breach of privacy and copyright law violation, but "the internet is the technological equivalent of the Wild West," Levy says. "By the time this works its way through the legal system, years will have gone by and your bank account will have been depleted."

"The legal system simply cannot keep up with technology."

Cultural shift

The only real solution for the time being, Levy says, is to not take those kinds of photos in the first place.

'The legal system simply cannot keep up with technology,' says tech analyst Carmi Levy. (Lionel Bonaventure/AFP/Getty Images)

"It might sound overly simplistic," he said. "But when relationships end these photos now become weapons used by one party against another and that happens time and again."

However, that seems unlikely.

Millennials who grew up in the digital age of cell phones and selfies have ushered in a shift in the culture of documenting our daily lives.

"I think it's really common," says Michelle Drouin, a developmental psychologist who specializes in social media and the growing use of sexting. "Sexting has become so integrated with sexuality. This is a part of becoming a sexual person in this decade."

Drouin says she is discouraged by how little people can do to protect their privacy and private images.

"I think we need a really aggressive campaign telling young people that these photos are forever," she said. "Teenagers are so vulnerable. They don't know yet if these photos will haunt them in the future."

Levin disagrees.

"It's human nature to take photos. The education there will fail," he said. "And people go on Reddit because they want to socialize. You're not going to change the way human beings behave. You want to find a way for them to get recourse and a legal system that helps them do that. We are missing that."

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Dad of man guilty in Rehtaeh Parsons case reportedly arrested in Wikipedia edits probe

The father of one of the men who pleaded guilty in the Rehtaeh Parsons case was arrested for allegedly using a computer at a Nova Scotia Canadian Forces base to make inappropriate web comments, and edit the Wikipedia entry about the girl's death, according to her father.

Glen Canning says he was contacted by a Halifax military police officer Wednesday morning. 

Wikipedia's revision history shows more than a dozen changes were made to its page about Rehtaeh. A quote attributed to Canning was changed to make it appear as though he said his daughter had consensual sex with two boys who were later convicted of child pornography.

The Department of National Defence said an individual was arrested Tuesday at CFB Shearwater, and questioned following a complaint about someone making inappropriate comments online.

The department wouldn't confirm the connection to the Rehtaeh case. They have said they are investigating allegations her Wikipedia page was altered from a DND IP address.

No charges were laid and the man was released.

Maj. Yves Desbiens says the investigation began in the fall of 2014.

He says the identity of the military member is protected by the Privacy Act.

Canning has long fought the publication ban on his daughter's name. In December, Nova Scotia's Public Prosecution Service was instructed not to prosecute anyone who publishes Rehtaeh's name as long as it's not used in a derogatory way.

Parsons attempted to take her own life at age 17 and was later taken off life support in 2013.

Her parents say she was cyberbullied and pushed to suicide after a photo of one of the boys having sex with her was passed around her high school.

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Stephen Harper, Mohamed Fahmy and the unmade phone call

The opposition continues to hammer away at Prime Minister Stephen Harper over his apparent refusal to directly intervene in the plight of Canadian journalist Mohamed Fahmy, who is on trial in Egypt.

Opposition Leader Tom Mulcair asked Harper about the case twice in question period Tuesday.

"Has the prime minister of Canada spoken with President el-Sissi of Egypt about getting Mr. Fahmy back to his home in Canada?" asked Mulcair, pointing out that Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott spoke to the Egyptian president on a number of occasions on behalf of an Australian journalist involved in the same case (who was subsequently released).

"We've raised this at all levels and will continue to do so in the ways that we believe are effective," answered Harper.

"So it's a no," retorted Mulcair, before moving onto another line of questioning.

Mulcair presses Harper on Fahmy1:57

Fahmy was arrested and jailed in Cairo on Dec. 29, 2013, along with two other Al-Jazeera English colleagues. They were covering protests against the ouster of then president Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Australian, Peter Greste, was eventually deported home.

Fahmy was accused of broadcasting "false news" and supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, which had been declared a terrorist group. He spent 411 days in jail before being released on bail last week to face a retrial.

Calls for a direct appeal

Whether Harper has spoken to el-Sissi remains unclear, though there are indications he has written letters to the Egyptian president about Fahmy's predicament. 

Fahmy's case is just the latest case of a Canadian or dual citizen whose situation abroad has led to loud calls for Harper's intervention. But in the case of Abousfian Abdelrazik, for example, the prime minister has remained reticent about any involvement on his part.

But why would Harper be so reluctant to reveal what he has done, leaving the impression of a leader who doesn't care about Canadians in trouble abroad?

The opposition only has theories.

"Maybe he has a lack of confidence in his relationship with these leaders or he is just not interested in doing that," said NDP foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar.

Liberal foreign affairs critic Marc Garneau notes things have changed since Fahmy was first arrested.

"The excuse that Fahmy was a dual citizen was valid until he was no longer a dual citizen," said Garneau. Fahmy gave up his Egyptian passport at the beginning of the month in hopes of being immediately deported to Canada. That didn't happen.

Garneau is at a loss to understand why the prime minister hasn't followed the Australian prime minister's example, because, he said, all other options have been exhausted.

But other observers aren't so sure.

"I never quite believe everything I read. There's always another shoe that's going to fall somewhere," said Keith Beardsley, a former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to Harper. 

Because there are such large gaps in the publicly available information about cases like Fahmy's, it is hard to know what goes into Harper's calculations, he said. The prime minister is briefed by diplomatic and security officials about these types of incidents and much of what he hears is classified.

"There's going to be all sorts of stuff in there that you and I would have no clue about. And some of it could be, if you go to high profile, what are the negative consequences for the guy over there?" said Beardsley.

On top of that, Beardsley added, Harper isn't a micro-manager when it comes to issues with foreign governments.

Ferry de Kerckhove agrees with Beardsley on that point. 

Hand's-off approach

"It's in keeping with his kind of a low-key approach to those kinds of issues. Leaving others to do their jobs," said the former Canadian ambassador to Egypt, who has also acted as Harper's sherpa at the Francophonie summit.

In Fahmy's case, according to de Kerckhove, his dual citizenship complicated matters and reduced Harper's influence.

"He probably doesn't want to get involved in the nitty-gritty of an issue in which there's not much to gain, because he knows at the end of the day that the system of the country involved will prevail over whatever he may be saying," he argued.

And now that the impediment of dual citizenship is gone?

"I think maybe there's a sense that [Harper] respects, however wacko it may be, the justice system of another country," said de Kerckhove.

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Young Canadian woman recruited to join ISIS in Syria

The family of a young Canadian woman who travelled to Syria after being radicalized say losing her was the most "shocking thing in the world" and that they wish CSIS had done more to prevent the 23-year-old's departure.

The woman, whom CBC News is calling Aisha to protect her identity, made the journey to Syria to join up with ISIS last summer, after taking an online course to study the Qur'an taught by a woman based in Edmonton, says her older sister Rabia (whose name has also been changed).

"We all went to work, came home, all her stuff was gone. She had packed all her winter clothes, took her computer and left," Rabia says.

"It was the most devastating, most scary, most shocking thing in the world."

Over the past several months, Rabia has been speaking to CBC News about her family's ordeal. Some details, such as names and the family's location, are being withheld for security reasons.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service declined to comment on the specific case, but said in an emailed statement that terrorism "including radicalization of Canadians and terrorist travel remains the most prominent threat to Canadian interests and our national security."

CBC investigation

The family's story is part of a CBC News investigation into extremism in Canada that shows young women in this country are not immune to the propaganda of ISIS.

If you have more information on this or related stories, email natalie.clancy@cbc.ca

Rabia alleges Aisha was recruited under the guise of an online class to study the Qur'an taught by a woman in Edmonton. But instead, Rabia says, Aisha learned how to get to the ISIS-controlled city of Raqqa in Syria.

CBC News has confirmed the identity of the woman in Edmonton and that she was asked to leave a mosque after she attempted to recruit people. She has not been charged in connection with this case.

Never coming home

When Aisha called home from abroad, she told her family she was never coming home — that Syria was where she was going to die.

The family had a moderate Muslim upbringing, Rabia says. Looking back, she says there were signs Aisha was changing. Aisha withdrew from her family and social circle, started wearing a niqab and retreated to her bedroom and computer, Rabia says.

Aisha also dropped out of college to study Islam full-time with the woman in Edmonton. The family believes it was that woman who paid for her plane ticket abroad, Rabia says.

CBC has not been able to independently confirm the details of Aisha's radicalization or how she funded her travel, but it's known that she went to Edmonton, then Toronto. She flew to Barcelona and on to Turkey, where she crossed the border into Syria.

CSIS won't comment on specific investigations, but Rabia says the agency had been tracking Aisha for nearly two years.

'I would have ripped her passport up'

Staff with the intelligence agency approached the family before Aisha left in the summer, but Rabia says they provided almost no information, aside from pointing out that Aisha's Twitter account featured the ISIS flag and followed some prominent ISIS members.

"They told us she had been interacting with people they thought were dangerous and were influencing her in a negative way, but they didn't give us enough information and it was all very vague."

"If they had shown me the emails between my sister and this girl. If they had let me listen to the recordings of them planning on going places," Rabia says, it would have given the family more to act on. 

"I would have ripped her passport up. There's no way I would have let her leave if I knew now that she was going to the craziest war zone in the world."

The intelligence agency can currently only collect and analyze information and doesn't have the "mandate to intervene to prevent terror plots from developing," CSIS said in a statement. 

While CSIS currently can't intervene in such a way, it can work with law enforcement partners like the RCMP to detain people believed to be involved in terrorist activities.

Canada has in some major cities integrated national security enforcement teams made up of agencies like the RCMP, local and municipal police, the Canada Border Services Agency and CSIS, which are meant to increase co-operation and information-sharing on national security threats.

The federal government has proposed legislation that would bolster CSIS's powers. Bill C-51 includes measures that would allow the security agency to disrupt travel plans or financial transactions of people the agency believes have been radicalized.  

The Conservative-backed bill faces opposition from the NDP and others who argue it's too broad and doesn't offer sufficient oversight, but it recently passed second reading in the House of Commons and is now headed to committee. 

Rabia says her family is furious the alleged recruiter in Edmonton is still free to influence other young Canadians.

She says the online course she believes Aisha was influenced by had 15 Canadian students, and that Aisha was with a Quebec woman during a recent Skype call.

The sisters are still in touch, talking or texting every two weeks, but Rabia says Aisha's tone has changed.

"Over time, reality's kind of showing her another light, and she's realizing it's not what she thought it was. And now her spirit is down. When we speak she sounds really sad and stressed."

Passport revoked

Jeff Weyers, a security researcher who tracks extremists, said the recruitment of Canadian women is concerning.

"You wonder what the attraction is for a female to go to the Islamic State, and join these groups given all the knowledge that we have of what happens to a female in terms of being used in servitude-type roles."

Rabia says she thinks Canada is too focused on "men jihadist fighters, that they're not thinking about the girls. They're just slipping through the cracks."

She says she's worried her sister can never come home for fear of imprisonment. Aisha's Canadian passport has been revoked.

"She didn't do anything for ISIS, she is just there…. cooking for people, helping people in hospitals. She's not out there with a gun in the front lines, because women aren't allowed to do that in Islam and ISIS."

For now, the family worries about what might happen abroad, but Rabia says the family also understands that there's likely no way out for Aisha after her decision to leave Canada for the fight in Syria.

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Hating the cold? Blame the jet stream

A persistent, quasi-stationary high pressure system off the West Coast has caused the jet stream to flow from the northwest down into the southeast, helping to bring frigid temperatures that have shattered cold weather records in Ontario and Quebec, according to a meteorologist at Environment Canada.

"So our air mass has been coming from the Northwest Territories and we've just been experiencing wave after wave of arctic air and that has been continuing for most of February," said Peter Kimbell, warning preparedness meteorologist.

"Meteorologists always point our finger at the jet stream," he said.

And it's not just Ontario and Quebec that have been bearing the brunt of the blast. Temperatures have plunged across the Prairies, Atlantic Canada and into the U.S. 

(Much of Western Canada, on the other hand, has been warmer than normal.)

Kimbell said February temperatures have been seven or eight degrees below average in Ontario and Quebec, sometimes even 10 degrees below. Parts of the Prairies have been four or five degrees below average, while much of Atlantic Canada has also been chillier than normal.

Unfortunately, there is little relief in sight. 

Environment Canada lifted cold weather warnings across Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes throughout the day Tuesday but is still forecasting chilly temperatures for the next few weeks. 

It will be probably be cold throughout February and into the first week of March, possibly into the second, Kimbell said. . 

How cold is it?

If you live in Ontario or Quebec and you've thought that maybe it feels colder than usual, you're not wrong. 

February has set a number of cold weather records, including daily temperature records in individual cities. 

Montrealers, for instance, woke up to the coldest Feb. 24 on record this morning with a temperature of –24.6 C, beating the –21.7 C recorded in 1992. 

It's also been a chilly month in terms of number of days below zero. 

Some areas of Ontario, including Toronto, Kitchener-Waterloo, Peterborough and Barrie, are on track to see no days above freezing for the entire month, according to a statement from Environment Canada released Monday. 

"This will set the stage for the first time an entire calendar month has been below freezing in the Kitchener and Toronto Pearson airport areas since February 1978," Environment Canada said.

This month is also on track to be the coldest in Ontario in terms of daily average temperatures since February 1979, Kimbell said. 

"We are basically in record territory," Kimbell said. 

However, some records suggest that 1934 was perhaps the coldest February recorded in the province. 

"For those few sites that actually have records going back into the 1800s, February of 1885 was also pretty cold too," he said. "So we've seen this kind of extreme cold before. It's certainly very rare."

'It's been brutal'

Despite the frigid temperatures, take heart because there is more winter behind us than ahead, according to the senior climatologist at Environment Canada. 

"It's been brutal, you don't need me to tell you that," Dave Phillips said from Florida, where he has been vacationing for the unseasonably cold month of February. 

March is on average five degrees warmer than February, Phillips said, and the days are getting longer.

Kimbell said the only reassurance he can offer Canadians who are sick and tired of the weather is that spring is a little less than a month away and winter will eventually be behind us. 

"It will come and temperatures will warm up," he said, " I'm not entirely sure when, but it will warm up."

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Spy agency monitors millions of Canadian emails to government

Canada's electronic spy agency collects millions of emails from Canadians and stores them for "days to months" while trying to filter out malware and other attacks on government computer networks, CBC News has learned.

A top-secret document written by Communications Security Establishment (CSE) analysts sheds new light on the scope of the agency's domestic email collection as part of its mandate to protect government computers.

CBC analyzed the document in collaboration with U.S. news site The Intercept, which obtained it from U.S. National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Canada's electronic spy agency watched visits to government websites and collected about 400,000 emails to the government every day, storing some of the data for years, according to the 2010 document. Today's volume is likely much higher given online traffic growth.

Common online activities involving the government include Canadians filing their taxes, writing to members of Parliament and applying for passports.

The program to protect government servers from hackers, criminals and enemy states is raising questions about the breadth of the collection, the length of retention and how the information could be shared with police and spy partners in other countries.

Chris Parsons, an internet security expert with the Toronto-based internet think tank Citizen Lab who viewed the document, said there are legitimate purposes for the agency to monitor your communications with the government.

"But you should be able to communicate with your government without the fear that what you say … could come back to haunt you in unexpected ways," says Parsons.

"When we collect huge volumes, it's not just used to track bad guys. It goes into data stores for years or months at a time and then it can be used at any point in the future."

CSE says "specific communications" are examined if they are "suspected to relate to a cyberthreat that could harm government of Canada systems and networks."

Metadata kept 'months to years'

The surveillance service vacuums in about 400,000 emails to and from the government every day and then scans them using a tool called PonyExpress to look for any suspicious links or attachments, according to the top-secret document.

On mobile? Click here for the CSE document

That automated system sifts through them and detects about 400 potentially suspect emails each day — about 146,000 a year. That system sends alerts to CSE analysts, who then can take a closer look at the email to see if it poses any threat.

Only about four emails per day — about 1,460 a year — are serious enough to warrant CSE security analysts contacting the government departments potentially affected.

"It's pretty clear that's there's a very wide catchment of information coming into [CSE]," said Micheal Vonn, policy director at the B.C. Civil Liberties Association.

CSE holds on to emails for "days to months," while metadata -- the details about who sent it, when and where -- is kept for "months to years," according to the document. The agency also records metadata about visits to government websites.

Under the Criminal Code, CSE is barred from targeting the content of Canadians' emails and phone calls, but it gets special ministerial exemptions when protecting government IT infrastructure.

The agency refused to provide specifics about the amount of email and metadata collected, and when they are deleted, insisting such information "could assist those who want to conduct malicious cyberactivity against government networks."

IT security analysts at CSE only use and retain information "necessary and relevant to identify, isolate or prevent harm to government of Canada computer networks or systems," the agency told CBC News in a written statement. Data that poses no threat or is not relevant to that goal "cannot be used or retained, and is deleted."

Civil liberties lawyer Vonn argues that there's "much more" Canadians should be told about the agency's collection of their data, such as how long it's held, without putting national security at risk.

"It's distressing that we have to find [details] out in dribs and drabs as opposed to having the appropriate discussion nationally and democratically.

"If we're going to have trust that our agencies are acting responsibly, we need as much light shone on the architecture, the laws and the rules, as possible," said Vonn.

Length of retention an 'utter mystery'

Cybersecurity experts say storing emails and data helps IT security analysts fix vulnerabilities.

CSE, under its mandate to protect federal government computer networks, vacuums up emails sent to and from the government and monitors website traffic, looking for malware and intrusions. (Canadian Press)

"Sometimes when they discover something they want to go back and check if this was the beginning or first of this particular kind of attack, so the data is actually very useful to them," said Queen's University computing professor David Skillicorn.

Still, documents suggest some of the data can be held as long as decades or even indefinitely.

CSE, under its cyberdefence mandate, is allowed to hold on to personal information — email addresses, IP addresses and other identifiers — for up to 30 years, then transfer it to Library and Archives Canada, according to the agency's own description of its databanks in the federal Info Source publication.

Vonn says it's "an utter mystery" why the government would need to retain personal information of those implicated in a potential cyberthreat for that long.

80 million probes a day

Skillicorn says the documents illustrate the great skill with which CSE is protecting both government websites and email traffic.

"I was impressed by the level of sophistication and cleverness and thoughtfulness," said Skillicorn. "It really does try to do everything that's possible to do in some very, very clever ways."

CSE says it's trying to set up defences because government networks are probed up to 80 million times a day by hackers looking for network vulnerabilities.

Skillicorn says most of those probes involve automated attempts equivalent to harmless mosquito bites, with only a tiny fraction meriting action.

Canada's economic activities, international roles and technology know-how make it an attractive target for cyberattacks by other countries, criminals and hackers.

On mobile? Click here for CSE's response

A single breach in the government's online armour can leave it vulnerable, with the potential that a wealth of sensitive data could end up in the wrong hands.

Soon after the 2010 top-secret presentation, several key federal departments — including the finance department and Treasury Board — suffered major attacks by hackers that forced them offline.

More recently, Canada Revenue Agency shut down in 2014 during income-tax season when a hacker broke into the site via a security bug known as Heartbleed.

Still, Vonn says while government cybersecurity is essential, citizens' level of trust in the post-Snowden era remains low, with many Canadians concerned about CSE activities.

"Accountability is central to understanding how this is keeping us safer and not in fact endangering our cybersecurity, our liberty, our ability to dissent."

---

CBC is working with U.S. news site The Intercept to shed light on Canada-related files in the cache of documents obtained by U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The CBC News team — Dave Seglins, Amber Hildebrandt and Michael Pereira —collaborated with The Intercept's Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Gallagher to analyze the documents.

For a complete list of the past stories done by CBC on the Snowden revelations, see our topics page. Contact us via email by clicking on our respective names or search for our PGP keys here.

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