Shots Fired On Parliament Hill

[bush_cheney2004]

You're confusing CSIS with CSEC..........As stated in a thread from several years ago, collection of Canadians electronic communications is already a reality, it just collected (without a warrant) by the Americans, British, Australians and New Zealanders........said data can be legally given to Canadian agencies, but can't be used in a court of law, because it was obtained sans a warrant.

Yes...a very important legal/technical reminder that some people still do not seem to understand. Five Eyes and other multilateral agreements makes the point moot when it comes to the collection, storage, and analysis of such data.

[Peter F]

The scary part of the whole thing is that it could have been a van instead of a car. It could have been 8 terrorists instead of just one. If one could just run in, then all 8 could have likely done the same. I'll leave it to the imagination as to what could have happened.

The really scary part is if 300 terrorists across the country went on a rampage and attacked whoever they came across! Can you imagine? Well, yes you can.

[Derek 2.0]

Yes...a very important legal/technical reminder that some people still do not seem to understand. Five Eyes and other multilateral agreements makes the point moot when it comes to the collection, storage, and analysis of such data.

Exactly, alterations to the laws would allow such agencies to make more effective use of said information.

[jacee]

The scary part of the whole thing is that it could have been a van instead of a car. It could have been 8 terrorists instead of just one. If one could just run in, then all 8 could have likely done the same. I'll leave it to the imagination as to what could have happened.

I think the scary thing is people ignoring the nature of these two acts - disturbed individuals acting independently - and creating unnecessary fear.

.

[jbg]

Guess nobody wants to talk about how Vickers shot an already dead mentaly ill person qualifies as being a hero.

Vickers presumably did not know that he was dead at the time, if he did. No experienced security person would risk ricochet by needlessly firing a weapon indoors. And if someone goes on a rampage, he probably needs to die in the process. Stopping with a live arrest sounds dangerous if not impossible and gives the aggressor the time to continue shooting. I'm very sorry if he was mentally disturbed, but the rights of others must take precedence.

At the end of the day....

... what we have here is just another workplace shooting by a disgruntled and somewhat deranged customer.... he wanted a passport and they wouldn't give it to him, so he saw the "corporation" as having wronged him, and he lashed out at it.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those directly affected, and we sympathize with everyone traumatized by these events, whether involved directly or not.

But Workplace shootings are not uncommon in Canada. In the US, more than 700 die in workplace shootings every year. Now, in Canada, our gutted Stats Can has not done any studies on workplace shooting for 10 years, but Macleans did a little survey here:

http://www.macleans.ca/new/canada/the-shootings-at-western-forest-in-nanaimo-point-to-a-bigger-problem

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make. "Workplace violence" occurs among workers or ex-workers who can' tfunction together. When someone invades a workplace with which he had no connection it's not "workplace violence"; it's a rampage.

The Muslim connection may (or may not) have been a trigger point....along with drugs, mental instability and the host of factors that usually accompany such events.....

The point there is that some parts of the Muslim community glorify violence. And ISIS has explicitly sought attacks on military or police forces in the West. I doubt that this guy was acting in coordination with ISIS but in his sick mind he thought it would bring their adulation. He did want to go to Syria to be an ISIS fighter.

But there are elements of media, politics, and society at large, who are trying to stretch this way beyond what it really is.

"encouraging fear" could be a partial definition of terrorism, and some of our politicians, our media, and even some of this forum are doing just that.

I think the scary thing is people ignoring the nature of these two acts - disturbed individuals acting independently - and creating unnecessary fear.

The "fear" is not unreasonable. The act was totally random. The victims had no reason to be hurt or to die. Edited October 26, 2014 by jbg

[cybercoma]

What political injustices? This guy was a CANADIAN, and clearly acted on behalf of his sympathy for ISIS. Why would anyone in Canada grow sufficiently agitated about overseas activities when he has no connection with the people there?

I said "perceived" as in he certainly thought so.

Are you under the illusion that the only geopolitical struggles and injustices of the world occur in Muslim nations?

No, but your posts suggest you do, considering the countless horrific atrocities that have been committed around the world that doesn't involve Muslims and doesn't get your attention. They certainly don't have the market cornered on violence. Unless you ignore what the Germans did less than a generation ago and what has happened in South America more recently and the violence in Africa since decolonization. Wherever there's geopolitical struggles, horrific violence usually follows. How do you get people to die for your cause? Give them something to believe in after life.

But you just keep blaming Islam because what I can only assume is myopia.

[WWWTT]

Vickers presumably did not know that he was dead at the time, if he did. No experienced security person would risk ricochet by needlessly firing a weapon indoors. And if someone goes on a rampage, he probably needs to die in the process. Stopping with a live arrest sounds dangerous if not impossible and gives the aggressor the time to continue shooting. I'm very sorry if he was mentally disturbed, but the rights of others must take precedence.

Don't understand why you would respond to my comment with this?

Before the details came out, it was made to sound like Vickers was the hero in all of this.

We know better now.

WWWTT

[jbg]

Before the details came out, it was made to sound like Vickers was the hero in all of this.

What's wrong with the truth? Do you really think Vickers knew he was firing into a corpse?

[jacee]

Vickers presumably did not know that he was dead at the time, if he did. No experienced security person would risk ricochet by needlessly firing a weapon indoors. And if someone goes on a rampage, he probably needs to die in the process. Stopping with a live arrest sounds dangerous if not impossible and gives the aggressor the time to continue shooting. I'm very sorry if he was mentally disturbed, but the rights of others must take precedence.

Clear case of a mentally disturbed individual committing suicide-by-cop, imo.

Which cop(s) take the credit for killing him is up to them.

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make. "Workplace violence" occurs among workers or ex-workers who can' tfunction together. When someone invades a workplace with which he had no connection it's not "workplace violence"; it's a rampage.

Maybe you missed the part about him being frustrated by the wait for a passport ... from a federal gov dept. One factor, not the only one though.

The point there is that some parts of the Muslim community glorify violence. And ISIS has explicitly sought attacks on military or police forces in the West. I doubt that this guy was acting in coordination with ISIS but in his sick mind he thought it would bring their adulation. He did want to go to Syria to be an ISIS fighter.

The "fear" is not unreasonable. The act was totally random. The victims had no reason to be hurt or to die.

You took my quote out of the context of the posts I was responding to:

There is reason to fear individual disturbed terroristic behaviour.

There is no reason to fear a 'vanload of 8', or "300" ... when the acts that occurred did not involve any coordinated or group activity, and the individuals involved don't appear to be capable of that kind of coordination.

But again ... the mickey mouse security at Parliament Hill needs some attention for sure.

.

Edited October 26, 2014 by jacee

[ReeferMadness]

The really scary part is if 300 terrorists across the country went on a rampage and attacked whoever they came across! Can you imagine? Well, yes you can.

Why stop there? What if 10,000.... no, wait, a million....no, hang on.

What if all 2 billion Muslims all decided to come to Canada to commit terrorism? We KNOW they all want to! Let's see, if they sneaked in through our weak border security 1,000 per day, then in just 5,500 years (give or take), it would be the biggest terrorism attack in history. Aren't you terrified? Why haven't you panicked yet? Doesn't it just want to make you write Harper and insist that he take away all your freedoms and privacy rights immediately???

[cybercoma]

Why stop there? What if 10,000.... no, wait, a million....no, hang on.

What if all 2 billion Muslims all decided to come to Canada to commit terrorism? We KNOW they all want to! Let's see, if they sneaked in through our weak border security 1,000 per day, then in just 5,500 years (give or take), it would be the biggest terrorism attack in history. Aren't you terrified? Why haven't you panicked yet? Doesn't it just want to make you write Harper and insist that he take away all your freedoms and privacy rights immediately???

Be realistic. There's already over 1 million Muslims in Canada. Clearly we're screwed.

[ReeferMadness]

Well, that's not even 3 years worth. They're afraid of our Emperor and won't dare risk an attack until they've outnumbered us at least 10 to 1.

Or... until that wimp Trudeau is in power.

[Icebound]

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make. "Workplace violence" occurs among workers or ex-workers who can' tfunction together. When someone invades a workplace with which he had no connection it's not "workplace violence"; it's a rampage.

That may be your definition, but It does not make it so... You might want to check out a professional take on "workplace violence"

http://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/psychosocial/violence.html

And of course he had a connection... He was a customer who was denied service.

The point there is that some parts of the Muslim community glorify violence. And ISIS has explicitly sought attacks on military or police forces in the West. I doubt that this guy was acting in coordination with ISIS but in his sick mind he thought it would bring their adulation. He did want to go to Syria to be an ISIS fighter.

I have an issue with all these "converts to Islam". These guys are not "converts to Islam"...they are converts to violence...and they would have converted to Cathoicism if it had gotten them into the old IRA, It just happens that the extremist du jour happens to be Islamic, but I am betting that any extremist organization would have done equally well.

Equating his "Islamism" with his violence is media BS. There are over a million Muslims in Canada, and the streets are not teeming with violence.

I'

The "fear" is not unreasonable. The act was totally random. The victims had no reason to be hurt or to die.

Yes, it is. I have no reason to die when I walk over to pick up my mail, but a totally random attack COULD occur by some deranged individual with an imaginary grievance. Tell you what... I am going to continue to pick up the mail, and the mailman will continue to deliver it.

[jacee]

Be realistic. There's already over 1 million Muslims in Canada. Clearly we're screwed.

Another case of keepitsimple equating "Muslims" with terrorists.

Some people just don't get it.

I think Peter F & ReeferMadness are being facetious too, poking fun at that ridiculous notion.

For the record ...

/ottawa-shooting-canadian-muslims-denounce-attacks-

Ihsaan Gardee, the executive director of the National Council of Canadian Muslims, denounced the attacks in a news conference on Thursday. He said an attack on one Canadian represented an attack on all Canadians."We stand united with Canadians in categorically condemning these cowardly and heinous acts. Our message to anyone who believes in violent extremist ideologies is that you have nothing to do with Islam,"

Edited October 26, 2014 by jacee

[cybercoma]

We stand united with Canadians in categorically condemning these cowardly and heinous acts

That's what those people want you to think so they can lull you into a false sense of security.

[Keepitsimple]

Another case of keepitsimple equating "Muslims" with terrorists.

Some people just don't get it.

Jacee - once again you are making things up......I simply commented that the way it went down, imagine if there were 8 of them instead of just one - or perhaps you forget how the Toronto 18 had conspired to storm Parliament - and we were fortunate enough to prevent it. Some people just don't get it.

[Peter F]

Why stop there? What if 10,000.... no, wait, a million....no, hang on.

What if all 2 billion Muslims all decided to come to Canada to commit terrorism? We KNOW they all want to! Let's see, if they sneaked in through our weak border security 1,000 per day, then in just 5,500 years (give or take), it would be the biggest terrorism attack in history. Aren't you terrified? Why haven't you panicked yet? Doesn't it just want to make you write Harper and insist that he take away all your freedoms and privacy rights immediately???

Yes, our imaginations know no bounds. Hell, Tom Clancy makes millions cooking up all sorts of what-ifs about terrorists.

[bush_cheney2004]

Yes, our imaginations know no bounds. Hell, Tom Clancy makes millions cooking up all sorts of what-ifs about terrorists.

Not any more....Mr. Clancy died last year.

[Icebound]

The scary part of the whole thing is that it could have been a van instead of a car. It could have been 8 terrorists instead of just one. If one could just run in, then all 8 could have likely done the same. I'll leave it to the imagination as to what could have happened.

Somebody in this thread also mentioned "surprise" that there isn't more of these kind of events. The reality is that there isn't all that much desire....and if there IS desire, there is not the opportunity... and if there is opportunity, there is not the resources... And if all those stars align, there can still be an alert sergeant-at-arms....or maybe even an efficient police force... to foil it all.

We can let ourselves be governed by television-inspired fictionalized imagination.... Or we could deal with the realities of the situation.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Icebound

[Big Guy]

What eventually happened to those Toronto 18 terrorists?

Edited October 26, 2014 by Big Guy

[WWWTT]

What's wrong with the truth? Do you really think Vickers knew he was firing into a corpse?

LOL!

Ya I admit that it would have been better to let security do their job

[jacee]

Jacee - once again you are making things up......I simply commented that the way it went down, imagine if there were 8 of them instead of just one - or perhaps you forget how the Toronto 18 had conspired to storm Parliament - and we were fortunate enough to prevent it. Some people just don't get it.

If that 'conspiracy' had merit ... why is there still only an unarmed security guard at the door of parliament?

Somebody didn't take it very seriously it seems.

And I think there should be more secure arrangements.

The incident in question involved one disturbed person carrying a very noticeable rifle.

It's the element of creating fear with "what ifs" that I find bothersome.

.

[jbg]

LOL!

Ya I admit that it would have been better to let security do their job

Dogs can do better than human security (link to thread). As you can see from the link, imagine what it would be like for someone of the attacker's ilk to be nailed by a bunch of Golden or Labrador Retrievers, or as in the case of those dogs, Belgian Mallinois?

[dre]

As stated in a thread from several years ago, collection of Canadians electronic communications is already a reality, it just collected (without a warrant) by the Americans, British, Australians and New Zealanders........said data can be legally given to Canadian agencies, but can't be used in a court of law, because it was obtained sans a warrant.

No. Whats collected are raw bytes which are becoming more and more useless as plain-text communication dies out. They have some bytes but they dont know whats in them unless they are unencrypted. And they have IP addresses and aliases but they cant connect those to people without help from the ISP or service provider, and they dont have to give that help without a warrant (although they are spinless and often do)

Thats why governments and organizations like the NSA and CSIS routinely make hundreds of thousands of requests per year to ISP's and Service providers. They DONT have your data. And this is why bills like the Internet Surveillance act include provisions that allow the government to force ISP's and Service providers to give the government access to their systems, install hardware onsite, or even force the companies to install it on their behalf.

And the door is about to get shut in the governments face by the next generation of E2EE devices. These spy agencies have wasted billions of dollars on information collection systems that wont be able to do anything besides collect encypted data. Apple estimates it would take the NSA 5 years to crack one of its new E2EE encrypted communications. But even if they are grossly underestimating the NSA and the NSA can crack one per minute, thats still only only 1440 per day that they can crack, and index to be data-mined. Theres 180 billion emails sent every single day.

The whole data-mining concept is almost over.

People almost universally dont like the idea of bulk electronic surveillance, and no matter what the government does the private sector will respond quickly with a solution. Its almost inconceivable that the government was stupid enough to go down this road and invest money in it.

[dre]

Mostly it's paranoids and terrorist sympathizers who worry about stuff like that.

Clueless.

This isnt about terrorists or terrorist sympathizers. Opposition to bulk electronic surveillance is global and almost universal.

This is about people that dont want their personal or sensitive information to be sitting in a government datacenter somewhere. Thats why we are starting to see NSA-Proof devices marketed and companies investing in new ways to keep the spooks out... Do you think when apple made an E2EE device they were targetting the lucrative "paranoids and terrorist supporters" demographic?

The reality is that NOBODY with any sensitive data wants the government to have their communications in a hard drive somewhere. Government leaks like a sieve... The US for example loses control of millions and millions of sensitive documents every year. Hundreds of thousands of employees and subcontractors have access to this data at any given time.

So if you are a company that is using electronic communications during the development of proprietary technology... or a company discussing a big risky litigation with its attorneys... or ANYBODY that has ANY sensitive electronic communications about ANYTHING, the very last thing you want is the government to take those communications and put them in a data center somewhere.

Yet more opposition comes from people that realize what a bottomless pit that the whole "data-mining" concept is, and what a flawed plan it is from a technological standpoint. Because nobody wants their data to be snooped theres now huge demand for solutions that keep the government out. People are researching new encryption techniques, and companies are marketing anti-spook devices. Not to mention the ammount of electronic data is exploding. So not only is the government going to end up in an "electronic arms race" with the private sector using taxpayer dollars, the ammount of data they need to store and the costs associated with it will never stop increasing.

THe government surveillance industry in the US is already bigger than the entire automobile manufacturing sector.

So... Opposition to this kind of thing has very little to do AT ALL with people worrying they will be personally caught planning some kind of crime. It comes from everyone with a modicum of technologic knowledge, a healthy distrust of government, or just any common sense what-so-ever.