Backgrounder No. 9

Security Screening

November 2004

The Security Screening program is one of the main operational responsibilities of Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). The goals of the program are to prevent non-Canadians who pose security concerns or risks from entering or receiving permanent residence in the country and to prevent anyone of security concern from gaining access to sensitive government assets, locations or information. The Security Screening Program is one of the most visible functions undertaken by CSIS.

The September 11th tragedy in the United States has refocused attention on the requirement for good security screening procedures throughout the Government of Canada. In the December, 2001 budget, the Government of Canada announced substantial increases in funding for CSIS over the next five years. Much of this increased budget has been earmarked towards both government and immigration screening programs.

On behalf of the Government of Canada, CSIS security assessments fall into three main program categories: Government Screening, Foreign Screening and Immigration and Citizenship Screening.

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Government Screening

The Government Screening Program provides security assessments for all government departments and institutions, with the exception of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The Service also has a site access program for airports, the Parliamentary Precinct and nuclear power stations. These programs assist in enhancing security and reducing the potential threat from terrorist groups and foreign governments which seek advantage from gaining access to classified information or other assets and materiel. Since September 11, the demand for CSIS advice has risen dramatically.

The majority of Government Screening resources are devoted to federal government departments. Under the Government Security Policy (GSP), federal employees, members of the Armed Forces or persons under contract to a government department who in the performance of their duties have access to classified government assets or information, are required to hold security clearances.

There are three levels of security clearance as defined by the GSP: Confidential (Level I), Secret (Level II) and Top Secret (Level III). The level of security clearance required is determined by the need for access to classified information or assets in the performance of duties associated with an individual's employment.

Level I and II security clearance requests, which are conducted electronically, require checks in CSIS data banks. Most result in a recommendation to grant the clearance being made to the Departmental or Agency Security Officer (DSO/ASO). Further enquiries including an interview with the subject or a full field investigation may be required at times, if the process reveals questionable information. A full field investigation is required for all Level III security clearances.

A field investigation includes CSIS records checks, the interview of friends, neighbours and employers, local police checks and possibly an interview of the applicant. During the course of the enquiries, every effort is made to explain the purpose of the questions being posed and participation in the interviews is voluntary.

The security screening process may reveal significant information which would lead CSIS to recommend that the requested clearance be denied. In other cases, CSIS may advise the DSO/ASO of information which, while being of concern, may be insufficient to warrant a recommendation to deny, but would nevertheless require departmental attention and appropriate action. While the Service assists the originating department by providing an assessment of the individual's reliability and loyalty to Canada, under the GSP, all departments have exclusive authority to grant or deny security clearances.

In 2003-2004, CSIS received 37,327 requests for site and airport access. A total of 37,508 security clearance requests were received for government departments and agencies including the Department of National Defence (DND). For areas of the federal government, other than DND, the median time required to process Level I applications was seven days. Level II applications required 11 days to process while Level III took 82 days. Times required for DND were 20, 18 and 96 days respectively.

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Foreign Screening

CSIS has reciprocal screening agreements with the governments of foreign states, foreign agencies and international organizations which provide them with security assessments. These agreements are all approved by the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness after consultation with Foreign Affairs Canada.

All persons affected by this procedure provide their agreement in advance. The requests for foreign screening typically fall within two categories: database checks and enquiries on Canadian residents wishing to take up residence in another country; or field checks and enquiries on former and current Canadian residents who are being considered for classified access in another country.

In 2003-2004, the Service received and processed 1,208 requests for security assessments in its Foreign Screening Program.

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Immigration and Citizenship Screening

The provision of security advice in immigration and citizenship matters is crucial to countering imported threats to the security of Canada. The screening program serves as a first line of defence against those who attempt to penetrate the country to undermine Canadian security.

Working closely with Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), the Service's Immigration Screening program's primary task is to provide security-related advice to CIC. The objective is to prevent persons who are inadmissible under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) from entering or gaining status in Canada.

One important change, that has been introduced in the past few years, from a security screening point of view, is the adoption of Front End Screening (FES) for all refugee claimants to Canada. FES is a government initiative to ensure that all refugee claimants arriving in Canada are checked against CSIS and RCMP records before they are sent to the Immigration and Refugee Board. The initiative was implemented to identify and filter potential security and criminal cases from the refugee claimant stream as early as possible in the determination process. Prior to FES, CSIS did not screen refugee claimants.

In addition to its new responsibilities for Front End Screening, the Service, for many years, has had the responsibility for conducting security screening of immigrants and refugees who apply for permanent residence status from both within Canada and outside Canada. CSIS provides advice to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration related directly to the security inadmissibility criteria contained in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. CSIS also provides CIC with security assessments on applicants for Canadian citizenship. CIC forwards all applications for citizenship to CSIS for review. The Service advises if any security concerns relating to a particular application surfaced in the course of its checks, and provides CIC with relevant security advice if such concerns come to light.

The use of information technology has greatly assisted in reducing the time needed to process requests from CIC. In 1996-1997, the Service began to receive its trace requests related to citizenship applications through an Electronic Data Exchange directly from CIC's Case Processing Centre in Sydney, Nova Scotia. Beginning in November 2001, CIC has also made available an input process for all immigration officers in Canada, enabling CIC front-line officers to send data to CSIS electronically, greatly facilitating the front end screening process. Screening requests for immigrants applying to CIC from within Canada are now all conducted electronically between the Service and CIC. Requests related to immigrants applications from outside of Canada traditionally took longer to process since such applications were sent to the Service on hard copy forms and mailed via diplomatic bags. However, electronic exchange systems installed at posts abroad have significantly reduced turnaround times. CSIS is also increasing the number of liaison officers abroad to further improve processing of these applications and reduce existing backlogs.

Over the fiscal year 2003-2004, the Service received some 44,907 requests for Immigration Screening from within Canada (including RDP) and issued 46,183 security clearance assessments. Additionally, the Service received some 24,243 Immigration Screening applications from outside Canada and 4,646 from the United States for a total of 73,796 immigration cases. The median turnaround time was 42 days (through the Electronic Data Exchange Program) for requests from within Canada. Under the Overseas Program, our Security Liaison Officers were consulted on 4,814 cases.

Citizenship Screening is conducted on the basis of threats to Canada's security as set out in s.19 of Citizenship Act. Over the past years, 203,356 citizenship requests were received from Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

The Front End Screening

The FES program, implemented to identify and filter potential security cases from the refugee claimant stream as early as possible in the determination process, received 22,681 cases over the past year.

Date modified: 2005-11-14

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