{"id":8916,"date":"2023-04-27T15:44:54","date_gmt":"2025-02-12T20:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.nsira-ossnr.gc.ca\/reviews\/our-reviews\/review-of-the-cse-ministerial-authorizations-and-ministerial-orders-under-the-cse-act-2\/"},"modified":"2025-02-25T08:39:54","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T13:39:54","slug":"backgrounder","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/nsira-ossnr.gc.ca\/en\/reviews\/find-a-review\/19-05\/backgrounder\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of the Communications Security Establishment’s ministerial authorizations and ministerial orders under the CSE Act: Backgrounder"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n Review of the Communications Security Establishment’s ministerial authorizations and ministerial orders under the CSE Act <\/h1>\n\n
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\n Backgrounder <\/h2>\n \n \n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
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Backgrounder<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Following the coming in to force of the Communications Security Establishment Act<\/em> (CSE Act), CSE received a new set of Ministerial Authorizations (MA) \u2013 written documents by which the Minister of National Defence authorizes CSE to engage in activity that risks contravening an \u201cAct of Parliament or interfering with a reasonable expectation of privacy of a Canadian or person in Canada.\u201d The CSE Act also created a legislative authority for the Minister of National Defence to \u201cdesignate electronic information or information infrastructures or classes of electronic information or information infrastructures as being of importance to the Government of Canada\u201d through a Ministerial Order (MO).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NSIRA\u2019s Foundational Review of CSE\u2019s Ministerial Authorizations (MAs) and Ministerial Orders (MOs) represents a different approach to reviewing MAs than that of the Office of the Communications Security Establishment Commissioner (OCSEC), CSE\u2019s former independent external review body. While OCSEC previously reported on the number of private communications, we leave this matter to CSE\u2019s classified annual report to the Minister. Further, it is not necessary to review whether Ministerial Authorizations are based on reasonable conclusions, which is now the responsibility of the Intelligence Commissioner. NSIRA chose to approach the Ministerial Authorizations as an opportunity to learn about CSE\u2019s operational activities, and the Ministerial Orders were reviewed as supplementary to the Ministerial Authorizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This foundational review highlighted the need to focus on Active and Defensive Cyber Operations immediately following the completion of this review, given that the Intelligence Commissioner does not approve these activities and that they represent a new aspect of CSE\u2019s mandate.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3255,"parent":5121,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"template-nsira-subpages.php","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false},"categories":[9,24],"tags":[44,78,74],"yoast_head":"\nReview of the Communications Security Establishment's ministerial authorizations and ministerial orders under the CSE Act: Backgrounder - National Security and Intelligence Review Agency<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nsira-ossnr.gc.ca\/en\/reviews\/find-a-review\/19-05\/backgrounder\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review of the Communications Security Establishment's ministerial authorizations and ministerial orders under the CSE Act: Backgrounder - 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