Colin Freeze

I wrote over 1,200 stories for VICE (a few of which are actually good!) so to choose a some to highlight here is hard but I’ll try.

Interesting that the company at the centre of this controversy has an Ottawa office. The ClearviewAI controversy of some year ago showed neither the Ontario nor federal privacy commissioner has a legislated mandate to regulate such a corporation .

4/4 Bottom line is that the @PrivacyPrivee v @rcmpgrcpolice spat shows tensions over what is fair law-enforcement 'open source' intelligence-gathering circa in 2024 -- especially when police hire vendors with ex-@CIA OSINT types babelstreet.com/about-us/newsr…

1/4 So one of the things that appears to be at issue here may relate to whether police have ways to access, through data broker vendors, to geolocation data posted by users of specific Internet services....

This new information, including how the NS government gravitated to alternative measures, appear in Justice Department materials released following several FOI requests

3/3) One additional consequence of the 13-year legal void is that a 1970s law remains in place despite it being "outdated" and "not amended in 45 years"

1/3) Industry pushback preceded government decision to leave in limbo a regulatory law passed in hopes of saving lives : #nspoli FOI Nova Scotia reviewed bar-bouncer law shortly after man’s death, but left it inactive, documents show /via @globeandmail theglobeandmail.com/canada/article…

Two women were murdered in 1983. Four decades later, Toronto police used genetic genealogy to solve the case theglobeandmail.com/canada/article…

From CP's @JimBronskill , China tangents arose in R v. Ortis: "Ortis saved a document with images of business cards of two [PRC] diplomats" Later a judge wrote this “could be interpreted as circumstantial evidence of Mr. Ortis preparing to share" classified material

From @shanedingman , news of a major #cdnpoli real estate prosecution collapsing apparently due to delay (R v Jordan). “We cannot begin, let alone complete, a trial on the merits in the allotted time."

Crown stays charges of bid rigging in condo renovations theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/ar…

If the ranks of @FBI special agents declined dramatically, Americans would debate whether that's a get-out-of-jail-free card for spies, terrorists, mobsters But a new #cdnpoli study suggests that's quietly been happening in Canada @rcmpgrcpolice Story x.com/globeandmail/s…

A 2021 tragedy is front page news as prosecutors reveal arguments that the accused is alleged to be a confessed white nationalist. theglobeandmail.com/canada/article… Here, a @globeandmail video from 2021 highlighting the immigrant family killed in the strike: youtube.com/watch?v=LV3mqL…

“Every night is a nightmare.” Ryan Sawyer’s death puts #NovaScotia’s failure to bring its own bouncer law into force under spotlight, from ⁦@Colinfreeze⁩ and me #NSpoli #NSlegislature theglobeandmail.com/canada/article…

In this @globeandmail story, @LindsayLeeJones and I explore how a man's death in Halifax speaks to a regulatory vacuum -- and a systemic #cdnpoli & #nspoli failing, when statutes are kept in stasis as legislatures defer proclamation powers to cabinet. theglobeandmail.com/canada/article…

Further to today's #cdnpoli G&M story theglobeandmail.com/canada/article… researchers are now tweeting actual aide-memoire memos of 1971 Canada's spy chief's "cause for uneasiness" re: PMO overtures to RCMP

Here's what @globeandmail reported in 1992 about the '69 cabinet minutes and future PM John Turner's "eloquent, dove-like pleas" to PM Pierre Elliott Trudeau. (Sorry no URL for 92 article)

1/2 For #cdnpoli purposes its so serendipitous that the illustrating photo has John Turner ( a security dove) whispering counsel in (security hawk) Pierre Elliott Trudeau's ear. According to 1969 cabinet minutes, they argued about how to use soldiers and police in Quebec